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The hidden bridge of Markarian’s Chain

Overall Photons: Francisco Javier Pérez Olvera, Manuel Alejandro Chavarría Silva, George William Hoffman, Kollar Istvan, Jonathan Schwab, Giovanni Lombardi, Fumio Saito, Francesco Morini, David Serquera, Lorenzo Lilli & Giampiero Lilli, Gianni Melis, Richard Mongold, Emanuele La Barbera, Michele Mazzola, Ashley Brown, Satoshi Iino, Jeff Ratino, Ulli Wittur Fee, Marco Martinelli, Roberto Volpini, Krzysztof Gaudy, Patrick Bisaillon, Darius Kopriva, Jacopo Fallai, Roberto Testi, Kyle Fisk, Andrea Iorio, Fernando Linsalata, Elisa Cuccu

Markarian’s Chain is an alignment of galaxies in the Virgo Cluster, at least seven of which appear to move together. This deep image comprising 660 hours of data collected by 29 astrophotographers reveals the bridge of ionized hydrogen that stretches from NGC 4438 to M86 — evidence of a previous gravitational interaction.