Antennae Galaxies

NGC 4038 / NGC 4039 · The Antennae

The route adopts the rounded 65-million-light-year distance in NASA’s Hubble Caldwell catalog. Published distance estimates differ; the displayed value is a reference for this illustrative journey.

The moving dashes represent light travelling between galaxies. Their speed and the spacing of the galaxy icons are illustrative.

Two galaxies, extended tails

The Antennae are a distorted pair, not a single regular disk. Long tails of stars, gas and dust extend beyond the bright central bodies. This instrument shows how tidal stretching relates to the two nuclei without assigning a single diameter or a numerical scale.

Two cores and an overlap region

NGC 4038 and NGC 4039 retain distinct central concentrations while their gas-rich bodies interact. Compressed gas supports new star clusters. The model lets you highlight the two cores or tidal tails. Pulsing and moving marks only guide the eye; they are not a simulation of a measured orbit.

Select Cores or Tails to highlight the parts of the interacting system. This diagram is schematic and not to scale.

A merger in progress

Gravity has drawn long streams of material from both galaxies. Over time the cores are expected to merge into a single larger galaxy. This encounter gives us a nearby example of how interactions reshape galaxies.