Discovery done by astronomers on the ring of stars in Milky Way galaxy 30 million light years away

Milky Way Galaxy (Photo - Canva)

A team of Indian astronauts has discovered the rings of stars named ‘Kathryn’s Wheel’, which are situated 30 million light years away from the Milky Way galaxy. This is a newly discovered ring of stars that is formed due to the two galaxies colliding with each other resulting in shockwave production and throwing out of interstellar gas during the collision.

As the collision occurred in the start formation area, it resulted in the production of cosmic rays, radiation and interstellar gas that eventually led to the gamma ray's emission.

The identifier of this gamma-ray emitting collisional ring galaxy or ‘Kathryn’s Wheel', are Pune-based professor Vaidehi S Paliya and professor Dhruba J Saikia from Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA).

Despite the fact that ‘Kathryn’s Wheel’ is situated 30 million light years away from Milky Way galaxy it is still not much studied because it is in the crowded area where the bright stars and dusts obscuration are surrounding it that make it difficult to do research.

This newly discovered ring of stars is forty times closer than the famous 'Cartwheel' galaxy. The Cartwheel Galaxy, also known as ESO 350-40 or PGC 2248, is a ring galaxy about 500 million light-years away located behind a dense star field and close to a bright foreground star.

There is a difference in size between the two galaxies involved in the collision; one is smaller than the other. The powerful tidal forces of the larger galaxy can tear apart the smaller one when they collide head-on. Scientists are still fascinated by galaxies' incredibly vast sizes.