---
title: "Bullseye!"
id: 110370
type: "post"
slug: "bullseye"
author: "NSE"
published: "2025-02-04T22:11:17+00:00"
modified: "2025-02-04T22:11:18+00:00"
canonical: "https://newspaceeconomy.ca/2025/02/04/bullseye/"
markdown_url: "https://newspaceeconomy.ca/2025/02/04/bullseye.md"
description: "This image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, released on Feb. 4, 2025, shows the gargantuan galaxy LEDA 1313424, aptly nicknamed the Bullseye. A far smaller…"
language: "en-US"
category:
  - "Current News"
  - "Space Economy"
  - "Space Exploration"
post_tag:
  - "Hubble Space Telescope"
  - "NASA"
  - "Syndicated"
---

# Bullseye!

[![](https://i0.wp.com/newspaceeconomy.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/bullseye.jpg?resize=696%2C653&ssl=1)](https://i0.wp.com/newspaceeconomy.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/bullseye-1.jpg?ssl=1)

*NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI*

This image from [NASA](https://www.nasa.gov/)’s [Hubble Space Telescope](https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/), released on Feb. 4, 2025, shows the gargantuan galaxy LEDA 1313424, aptly nicknamed the Bullseye. A far smaller blue dwarf galaxy went through the Bullseye’s center, leaving nine star-filled rings. Astronomers using [Hubble](https://newspaceeconomy.ca/2025/06/16/hubble-the-telescope-that-revealed-the-universe/) identified eight visible rings, more than previously detected by any telescope in any galaxy, and confirmed a ninth using data from the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii. Previous observations of other galaxies show a maximum of two or three rings.

Hubble and Keck’s follow-up observations also helped the researchers prove which galaxy plunged through the center of the Bullseye — a blue dwarf galaxy to its center-left. This relatively tiny interloper traveled like a dart through the core of the Bullseye about 50 million years ago, leaving rings in its wake like ripples in a pond. A thin trail of gas now links the pair, though they are currently separated by 130,000 light-years.

[Read more about this “serendipitous discovery.”](https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/hubble-investigates-galaxy-with-nine-rings/)

*Image credit: [NASA](https://www.nasa.gov/), [ESA](https://www.esa.int/), Imad Pasha (Yale), Pieter van Dokkum (Yale)*

Source: [NASA](https://www.nasa.gov/)