Astronomers have taken a stunning photo of a very massive cluster of galaxies, MACS J0416.1-2403.
This image of the galaxy cluster MACS J0416 combines data from three telescopes – Hubble (showing the galaxies and stars), Chandra (diffuse emission in blue), and the Jansky Very Large Array (diffuse emission in pink). MACS J0416 acts as a powerful natural lens by bending and magnifying the light of far-more-distant objects behind it. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CXC / NRAO / AUI / NSF / STScI / G. Ogrean, Stanford University / J. Lotz, STScI / HFF Team.
This image of MACS J0416.1-2403 (MACS J0416 for short) combines data from NRAO’s Karl J. Jansky Very Large Array and two of NASA’s space telescopes — Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble. Each telescope shows a different element of the cluster.
According to astronomers, MACS J0416 is located in the constellation Eridanus, approximately 4.3 billion light-years away from Earth.
This giant cluster has a combined mass of about 160 trillion times the mass of the Sun.
As with all galaxy clusters, MACS J0416 contains a significant amount of dark matter, which leaves a detectable imprint in visible light by distorting the images of background galaxies.
In this image, dark matter appears to align well with the blue-hued hot gas.
The cluster contains many other features, such as a compact core of hot gas.
Together with five other galaxy clusters, MACS J0416 is playing a leading role in the Hubble Frontier Fields Program, which seeks to analyze the mass distribution in these massive clusters and to use the gravitational lensing effect of these objects, to peer even deeper into the distant Universe.
In December 2015, MACS J0416 was announced as gravitationally lensing the Tayna galaxy — the faintest galaxy ever seen in the early Universe.
Like a zoom lens on a camera, MACS J0416’s gravity boosts the light of the galaxy to make it look 20 times brighter than normal.
