NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope takes a peek into an intriguing dwarf galaxy LEDA 677373, 14 million light-years away from Earth where stars refuse to form.
Hubble, as the telescope is popularly known, helped shape men's understanding of the cosmos by studying distant bodies in the universe. Recent photographs released by ESA show a tiny dwarf galaxy, a collection of stars and cosmic gasses identified by the telescope through the colors and light they emit. The colorful galaxy intrigued astronomers, but due to its size, the telescope can only view the closest cluster to Earth.
The galaxy is composed of gas that could potentially turn into stars that don't end up being one and "stubbornly" refuses to do so, according to Astronomy Now. Hubble telescope pointed its innovative engineering to the dwarf planet to understand why. The telescope captured the galaxy's stars at different wavelengths; this allowed the researchers and astronomers to determine the age of a star. And based on their findings, the galaxy is almost 6 billion years, enough time to give birth to a bounty of stars - but it didn't.
But the believed stubborn star proved to be a victim. "Rather than being stubborn, LEDA 677373 seems to have been the unfortunate victim of a cosmic crime," a NASA official said in a statement. It turned out another galaxy, spiral Messier 83, looks like it is stealing vital gasses from LEDA 677373 that causes stars to stop forming.
The formation of stars is another cosmic mystery scientists and astronomers are looking at. Although there are identified ways and processes on how they form, various factors such as the influence of neighboring galaxies, gasses and solar flares can affect how a star is born or formed.
Some stars successfully form but dies rapidly, while some, just like the case of the stubborn dwarf galaxy LEDA 677373, all the ingredients are present and yet no stars formed despite the environment.
The Hubble Space Telescope and the team behind it work 24/7 to provide scientists and astronomers data to enable a better understanding of the cosmic community the Earth belongs.