Hubble Space Telescope image has Wisconsin flavor

Polar Ring Galaxy NGC 4650A (Courtesy The Hubble Heritage Project; © 1990-99 The Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc.)

Four scientists with Wisconsin ties are part of a team who played a key role in the selection of the latest object to be observed by the Hubble Heritage Project – a public outreach program of the Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute.

The team of scientists helped guide the selection of a polar ring galaxy, known as NGC 4650A, that was chosen by popular vote from among three possibilities posted at the Hubble Heritage web site

The four team members with Wisconsin ties are: UW–Madison astronomy professors Linda Sparke and John Gallagher; UW–Madison alumna Lynn Matthews, a native of Green Bay and now of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory; and Lancaster native Anne Kinney, also a UW–Madison alumna and a leader of the Hubble Heritage Project.

The galaxy is known as a “polar ring” galaxy because it has two disks, a plane of stars much like our Milky Way and, at nearly right angles, an outer disk configured in a polar orbit. The second, larger disk was probably formed in a galactic collision. Because it extends far above the inner disk, it can serve as a probe of gravitational forces in the outer halo of the galaxy, a neighborhood where scientists think invisible dark matter lurks.

The Hubble Heritage Project is an effort by the Baltimore-based Hubble Space Telescope Science Institute to build a bridge to better public understanding of astronomy and astrophysics by inviting the public to help select objects for observation.

High-density images of this and other objects photographed through Hubble can be obtained from the Space Telescope Science Institute news web site.