Theme: Frontier Fields

 

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Text, Viewspace. The show will continue in 15 seconds. Coming up: Explore deep space with nature's magnifying glass. 

 

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The text appears on a background of stars which move slowly towards and past us. 

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Floating through space, surrounded by glowing stars and spinning galaxies.

 

Like the words in a history book, galaxies narrate the story of the universe.

 

Yet, even with the Hubble Space Telescope, there are some galaxies that are too faint and far away to see.

 

On occasion, though, nature lends a hand to help us to understand some of these otherwise invisible galaxies.

 

Light usually travels along straight paths.

 

However, the gravity of a massive object warps the space around it.

 

As light passes the object, it curves to follow the warped space.

 

Clusters of galaxies are the most massive objects in space.

 

Illustration of Hubble in space collecting data from a distant galaxy.

 

With its enormous gravitational field, a galaxy cluster can act like a gigantic lens to redirect and magnify light from an even farther galaxy behind the cluster.

 

This trick of nature called gravitational lensing, allows us to find faraway galaxies we could never see otherwise, and to glimpse once-secret chapters of the universe's early history.

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Text, Myth versus reality. The myth is on the left while the reality is on the right. Myth - There is no gravity in space. Reality - Gravity affects all mass-containing objects and light. Therefore, any object in space that has mass has gravity. The more massive an object is, the greater its gravitational pull. Any body in space has gravity. In fact, gravity is what makes objects orbit one another. Without gravity, moons wouldn't orbit planets and planets wouldn't orbit stars.

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Rotating planet with atmosphere, galaxies in space as backdrop. Text, at a Glance. A warped point of view.

 

The sky with stars and yellow disks of light.

 

Text, a cluster of galaxies can act like a giant lens in space.

 

Gravitational lensing. A giant lens in space between us and a distant source of light would bend and focus that light, allowing us to see it better. Diagram, earth, hypothetical glass lens in space, distant source of light.

 

Like a lens, a cluster's gravitational force can concentrate the light from an even-farther galaxy, magnifying it.

 

Diagram, distant galaxy, galaxy cluster, Hubble.

 

But depending on how these gravitational lenses are shaped, our views of the faraway galaxies can become distorted.

 

When a gravitational lens has a smooth, spherical shape, we might see a ring of light.

 

Image, distant, lensed object.

 

Text, If the gravitational lens is elongated, we sometimes see multiple, evenly spaced projections of the distant galaxy. Image, distant, lensed object.

 

Text, When the gravitational lens is clumpy and uneven, as galaxy clusters are, we often see the more distant galaxies as smeared arcs or streaks of light. Image, gravitational lens.

 

Images of galaxies.

 

Such gravitational arcs are common features in hubble images of the most massive galaxy clusters.

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Cluster of bright white galaxies.

 

Text, Galaxy Cluster Abell 68. The arcs and streaks of light in this galaxy cluster, called Abell 68, are the magnified and distorted projections of galaxies lying far beyond the cluster.

 

One streak of light is circled.

 

Text, The light from the distant galaxies is bent and stretched by the cluster's powerful gravitational might.

 

A galaxy with two glowing red dots next to each other inside an oblong cloud of gas is circled.

 

Text, One galaxy's appearance is warped in a way that makes it resemble an evil-eyed alien invader.

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Top left, a black and white picture of a minotaur. Top right, a color picture of stars.

 

Text, MYTH versus REALITY

 

Myth side. Text, The Hubble Space Telescope can only observe visible light.

 

Reality side. Text, In addition to helping us see the visible light of objects and materials in the universe more clearly, Hubble also can observe some wavelengths of infrared and ultraviolet light, which are invisible to the human eye. These other forms of light provide different information about what the universe is made of and how it changes over time.

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Text, Galaxy Cluster Abell 2 7 4 4. Combining visible and infrared light, this Hubble Space Telescope image is one of the deepest views ever captured of a cluster of galaxies.

 

The cluster, called Abell 2 7 4 4, was the first observed during the Frontier Fields program.

 

In this image, there are thousands of background galaxies that appear, including some of the faintest and most distant galaxies ever detected.

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Many galaxies in space.

 

Text, Abell 2744 Parallel Field. This is the parallel field for galaxy cluster Abell 2744 from the Frontier Fields program.

 

Scattered throughout the image are roughly 3,000 galaxies, some never before seen in such detail -- some never seen before at all.