Spying a spiral through a cosmic lens - Lemmy.World

Expand your imagination 🍥 What appears to be a single galaxy is actually two that are very far apart! The closer galaxy lies in the center of the image, while the more distant galaxy appears to be wrapped around it in a phenomenon we call an “Einstein ring.” Einstein rings occur when light from a distant galaxy gets bent by the gravity of a massive closer-by object, in this case another galaxy. The light from the distant galaxy that would otherwise travel in a straight line follows the bend of gravitationally warped spacetime, brightening the light from behind the galaxy and acting as a sort of natural magnifying glass. Einstein predicted this effect in his theory of relativity. https://esawebb.org/images/potm2503a/ [https://esawebb.org/images/potm2503a/]