Astronomy Picture of the Day [1]Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2021 October 4 [2]The picture shows a Hubble image of colliding galaxies NGC 4676 known as the Mice for their long stellar tails. Please see the explanation for more detailed information. NGC 4676: When Mice Collide Image Credit: [3]NASA, [4]ESA, Hubble; Processing & Copyright: [5]William Ostling ([6]The Astronomy Enthusiast) Explanation: These two mighty galaxies are pulling each other apart. Known as the "[7]Mice" because they have such long tails, each [8]spiral galaxy has likely already passed through the other. The [9]long tails are created by the relative [10]difference between gravitational pulls on the near and far parts of each [11]galaxy. Because the distances are so large, the [12]cosmic interaction takes place in slow motion -- over hundreds of millions of years. [13]NGC 4676 lies about 300 million [14]light-years away toward the constellation of Bernice's Hair ([15]Coma Berenices) and are [16]likely members of the [17]Coma Cluster of Galaxies. The [18]featured picture was taken with the [19]Hubble Space Telescope's [20]Advanced Camera for Surveys in 2002. These galactic mice will probably [21]collide again and again over the next billion years so that, instead of continuing to pull each other apart, they [22]coalesce to [23]form a single galaxy. Follow APOD in English on: [24]Facebook, [25]Instagram, or [26]Twitter Tomorrow's picture: polar sunrise __________________________________________________________________ [27]< | [28]Archive | [29]Submissions | [30]Index | [31]Search | [32]Calendar | [33]RSS | [34]Education | [35]About APOD | [36]Discuss | [37]> __________________________________________________________________ Authors & editors: [38]Robert Nemiroff ([39]MTU) & [40]Jerry Bonnell ([41]UMCP) NASA Official: Phillip Newman [42]Specific rights apply. [43]NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices A service of: [44]ASD at [45]NASA / [46]GSFC & [47]Michigan Tech. U. References 1. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html 2. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/2110/NGC4676_HubbleOstling_4555.jpg 3. https://www.nasa.gov/ 4. https://esahubble.org/ 5. https://www.instagram.com/the_astronomy_enthusiast/ 6. https://theastroenthusiast.com/ 7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mouse 8. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/spiral_galaxies.html 9. http://burro.astr.cwru.edu/NAS/NAS.html 10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactic_tide 11. https://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/what-are-galaxies 12. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjjRfOT87Wc 13. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1974ApJ...187..219S/abstract 14. https://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/cosmic_distance.html 15. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coma_Berenices 16. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1961ApJ...133..726B/abstract 17. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap180326.html 18. https://theastroenthusiast.com/ngc-4676-from-hubble/ 19. https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/story/index.html 20. https://www.nasa.gov/content/hubble-space-telescope-advanced-camera-for-surveys 21. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130514.html 22. https://www.boredpanda.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/two-cats-better-than-one-5-60a76c5ce2159__700.jpg 23. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120604.html 24. https://www.facebook.com/AstronomyPictureOfTheDay 25. https://www.instagram.com/astronomypicturesdaily/ 26. http://twitter.com/apod/ 27. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap211003.html 28. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html 29. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/apsubmit2015.html 30. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/aptree.html 31. https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apod/apod_search 32. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/allyears.html 33. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod.rss 34. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/edlinks.html 35. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html 36. http://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?date=211004 37. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap211005.html 38. http://www.phy.mtu.edu/faculty/Nemiroff.html 39. http://www.phy.mtu.edu/ 40. https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/jbonnell/www/bonnell.html 41. http://www.astro.umd.edu/ 42. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html#srapply 43. https://www.nasa.gov/about/highlights/HP_Privacy.html 44. https://astrophysics.gsfc.nasa.gov/ 45. https://www.nasa.gov/ 46. https://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/ 47. http://www.mtu.edu/