Incredibly Detailed Picture Takes Space Research to Whole Different Level
An astronomer, Enrico Congiu from the Universidad de Chile, used the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile to take a detailed picture of a galaxy called Sculptor. Co-authors Kathryn Kreckel and Fabian Scheuermann from Heidelberg University, along with numerous other contributors and institutions, assisted as well. They then took this picture on June 18, 2025, taking 50 hours to find the best position for the perfect image.
After taking the photo, Enrico Congiu stated, “I personally find these images amazing. What amazes me the most is that every time I look at them, I notice something new – another nebula, a splash of unexpected color or some subtle structure that hints at the incredible physics behind it all.”
Sculptor has many similarities to the Milky Way (our galaxy), since it is considered to be a starburst galaxy that has lots of stellar action, referred by NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) as “An active galaxy with an extraordinarily high amount of star formation, classifying it as a ‘starburst’ galaxy.”
This property created Sculptor to be similar to the Milky Way, and although the Milky Way is not a starburst galaxy, it instead has regions where star formation occurs at a higher rate than usual, referred to as mini-starbursts.
Scientists who participated in the photoshoot report that taking this picture was very rare, as Sculptor proved to be the absolute perfect distance away for a good photo, which is about 11 million light years.
This picture has proven to be scientifically important due to the incredibly detailed, “thousand-color” view of the Sculptor Galaxy, “Allowing scientists to study its internal structure, individual stars, and the distribution of gas and dust with unprecedented clarity”, said Enrico Congiu.
The image will also aid in understanding how small-scale star formation processes can have a profound impact on the evolution of an entire galaxy.
Another perk is that the photo can provide additional insights into the interactions between visible matter and dark matter. Dark matter is a mysterious substance believed to comprise a significant portion of the universe, first proposed by Fritz Zwicky in the 1930s while studying the Coma Cluster of galaxies.
Dark matter research will now be able to progress because amongst the Sculptor Galaxy, there is a Sculptor Dwarf Galaxy (a different galaxy that contains dark matter), according to Scienceline.
This research was accepted for publication in the Journal of Astronomy & Astrophysics. According to the Daily Galaxy, the detailed image and planetary nebulae discovery could significantly enhance understanding of stellar evolution in galaxies beyond the Milky Way.