Nā ʻUhane Māhoe Huki Pū i ke Ola
Image Credit & Copyright:
Image Credit:
International Gemini Observatory /
NOIRLab/NSF/AURA
Nā ʻUhane Māhoe Huki Pū i ke Ola,
is the Hawaiian name given to this
image of a pair of spiral galaxies locked in
a mutual gravitational embrace.
Some 200 million light-years
distant toward the high flying constellation Pegasus
their spectacular, galactic scale merger is captured in sharp detail in
the image from the 8.1 meter
Gemini North
telescope on Maunakea, Hawai‘i.
The galaxy pair,
known as NGC 7253 and Arp 278,
was chosen as a target, researched, and given a
Hawaiian name by high school students
in the joint Gemini Observatory and
University of Hawaiʻi
Project Hōkūlani internship program.
The name translates to
"The Twin Spirits Pulling Together Creating Life".
That's both culturally and astronomically appropriate for
galaxy collisions
that trigger a cosmic
maelstrom of star formation
from galactic reservoirs of elemental building blocks of life.
These merging galaxies
are found within a region of Pegasus identified
as the Hawaiian navigational constellation
Ka Lupe o Kawelo.