'Frankenstein' Galaxy Surprises Astronomers

About 250 million light-years away, there's a neighborhood of our universe that astronomers had considered quiet and unremarkable. But now, scientists have uncovered an enormous, bizarre galaxy possibly formed from the parts of other galaxies.

A new study to be published in the Astrophysical Journal reveals the secret of UGC 1382, a galaxy that had originally been thought to be old, small and typical. Instead, scientists using data from NASA telescopes and other observatories have discovered that the galaxy is 10 times bigger than previously thought and, unlike most galaxies, its insides are younger than its outsides, almost as if it had been built using spare parts.

"This rare, 'Frankenstein' galaxy formed and is able to survive because it lies in a quiet little suburban neighborhood of the universe, where none of the hubbub of the more crowded parts can bother it," said study co-author Mark Seibert of the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science, Pasadena, California. "It is so delicate that a slight nudge from a neighbor would cause it to disintegrate."

Seibert and Lea Hagen, a graduate student at Pennsylvania State University, University Park, came upon this galaxy by accident. They had been looking for stars forming in run-of-the-mill elliptical galaxies, which do not spin and are more three-dimensional and football-shaped than flat disks. Astronomers originally thought that UGC 1382 was one of those.

But while looking at images of galaxies in ultraviolet light through data from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX), a behemoth began to emerge from the darkness.