Overview
- The Hubble image released Friday shows NGC 4698, a spiral galaxy about 55 million light-years away in the Virgo Cluster, with its inner stars and gas rotating nearly perpendicular to the outer disk.
- The galaxy's bulge extends at almost a right angle to the outer plane, producing a faint glow above and below the dusty disk while the outer arms retain a normal spiral look.
- Astronomers say the best explanations are external gas accretion or a past minor merger, a view supported by reports of a short hydrogen tail trailing from the galaxy's edge.
- Observers also report signs that the galaxy's central supermassive black hole—millions of times the Sun's mass—is actively accreting, linking the misaligned inner disk to central fueling.
- Researchers plan follow-up spectroscopy and mapping to date the event and test formation scenarios, and they say NGC 4698 offers a rare nearby example to study how cluster interactions reshape galaxies.