The European Space Agency released Hubble Space Telescope imagery of NGC 4698, a spiral galaxy located roughly 55 million light-years away in the constellation Virgo whose core rotates perpendicular to its outer disc.
NGC 4698 is one of more than one thousand galaxies in the Virgo Cluster, the closest large cluster bound together by gravity. Like the Milky Way, the galaxy contains a thin disc of stars, gas, and dust wrapped in spiral arms around a central bulge. Its bulge produces a diffuse off-white glow from stars that are smaller, older, and cooler than the massive blue stars across the outer disc. These tightly packed stars orbit a supermassive black hole with millions of times the mass of the Sun, which ESA reported is actively drawing in gas and growing.
Most spiral galaxies maintain an aligned plane, but NGC 4698 is one of only a few known systems where the central bulge extends at a right angle from the disc. Stars and gas nearest the core spin perpendicular to the surrounding structure. Astronomers believe external material caused the tilt: gas funneled inward from outside the galaxy could have settled into an angled central formation. A short tail of hydrogen streaming from one side indicates NGC 4698 likely underwent a minor galactic merger in the past.
The observation originated under Hubble programme 18103, led by principal investigator D. Thilker with the MAUVE-HST Team. The resulting view shows winding spiral arms that form an outer ring without reaching the core, laced with red-brown dust lanes and bright patches of star formation.
