Astronomers have learned about the difficulty of classifying the galaxy NGC 2775 due to its shape

The galaxy NGC 2775, located 67 million light-years from Earth in the constellation of Cancer, has an unusual shape that makes it difficult to classify. It resembles an elliptical galaxy with its large, featureless center, but its dust ring with outer star clusters is more common in spiral galaxies. This was reported by Popular Science magazine on November 26.

According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the answer has not yet been found. Astronomers tend to either an elliptical or spiral classification, while some experts believe that the combination of their features may indicate a "lenticular" shape. This may also be true, but experts are still not sure how such galaxies form.

Some evidence indicates that NGC 2775 acquired its unusual shape as a result of a merger with other galaxies billions of years ago. Although this is not visible in the Hubble image, NGC 2775 has a tail of hydrogen stretching almost 100,000 light-years, which may be the remnants of absorbed galaxies.

New observations using space telescopes are likely to be able to definitively reveal the mystery of the galaxy NGC 2775. Until then, most astronomers considered it to be a flocculating spiral galaxy—with very hazy, intermittent spiral arms.

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Earlier, on November 12, Science X magazine reported the discovery of a super-powerful "star factory" in the universe. According to the publication, the Y1 galaxy is forming stars at a rate about 180 times faster than the Milky Way. It was clarified that such acceleration could not last long, but scientists believe that such bursts of activity helped young galaxies gain mass quickly.

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