Galaxy clusters are some of the most massive structures that can be found in the Universe — giant groupings of galaxies bound together by gravity. This spectacular image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals one of these clusters, known as RXC J0032.1+1808, whose light took over 4 billion years to reach us.
This Hubble image shows the rich galaxy cluster RXC J0032.1+1808. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / RELICS.
Galaxy clusters can contain thousands of galaxies all held together by the glue of gravity.
At one point in time they were believed to be the largest structures in the Universe — until they were usurped in the 1980s by the discovery of superclusters, which typically contain dozens of galaxy clusters and groups and span hundreds of millions of light-years.
However, clusters do have one thing to cling on to; superclusters are not held together by gravity, so galaxy clusters still retain the title of the biggest structures in the Universe bound by gravity.
The amount of matter condensed in galaxy clusters is so high that their gravity is enough to warp the fabric of spacetime, distorting the path that light takes when it travels through the cluster.
In some cases, this phenomenon produces an effect somewhat like a magnifying lens, allowing us to see objects that are aligned behind the cluster and which would otherwise be undetectable from Earth.
This image of the massive galaxy cluster RXC J0032.1+1808 was taken by Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) and Wide-Field Camera 3 (WFC3) as part of an extensive observing program called Reionization Lensing Cluster Survey (RELICS).
RELICS imaged 41 giant galaxy clusters over the course of 390 Hubble orbits, aiming to find the brightest distant galaxies.
Studying these galaxies in more detail with both current telescopes and the forthcoming NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will hopefully tell us more about our cosmic origins.
“Expected to launch in 2018, the JWST is designed to see in infrared wavelengths, which is exceedingly useful for observing distant objects,” NASA astronomers explained.
“As a result of the expansion of the Universe, very distant objects are highly redshifted — their light is shifted towards the redder end of the spectrum — and so infrared telescopes are needed to study them.”
“While Hubble currently has the ability to peer billions of years into the past to see ‘toddler’ galaxies, the JWST will have the capability to study ‘baby’ galaxies, the first galaxies that formed in the Universe,” they said.
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