Hercules (dwarf galaxy)

The Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, ( Hercules dSph ) is a dwarf galaxy and a companion galaxy of the Milky Way in a galactocentric distance of about 430,000 light years. Your name is derived from its position, as it is in the constellation Hercules.

An international team of astronomers succeeded in 2006, the discovery of the Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, a tiny companion of the Milky Way using data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. In 2007, further observations with the Large Binocular Telescope ( LBT ) were then carried out in Arizona. The image of Hercules dwarf galaxy was obtained using the high- tech Large Binocular Camera ( LBC-Blue ), which is located at the prime focus of the two mirrors.

Properties

Almost all objects in the family of the smallest dwarf galaxies have a round shape. The Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, with an apparent magnitude of about 25.5 may very faint, but it has the unusual appearance of a flat disc or a cigar. Similar to our Milky Way, the stars in many large galaxies in a disk-like structure. In a small galaxy, similar to the Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, which despite its name has only one ten millionth of the number of stars in our galaxy, never before a disk-like structure was observed. Furthermore, was found among the millions of well -studied galaxies have a cigar -like shape.

Cause of the extraordinary form is the gravitational deformation by our Milky Way. In the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, the same effect can be observed. Due to its orbit, the Hercules Dwarf Galaxy has come exceptionally close to the center of the Milky Way.

" The Hercules Dwarf Galaxy is either unlike any of the millions galaxies studied so far, or circles our galaxy on an extremely plunging almost in the center of orbit. "