June 27, 2008 - New York Times
Siamese twin galaxies. Ninety million light-years away from us, these two, almost identical spiral galaxies, NGC5427, left, and NGC 5426, look like they're doing a do-si-do in the Virgo constellation. The image was taken by the Gemini South telescope in Chile. Although they look like they're just passing by each other, the gravitational tugging has already begun to reshape the two galaxies and set off a wave of star formation. In about 100 million years, the two will merge into one elliptical galaxy.
(Editor's Note: A previous version of this slide show referred incorrectly to the position of the galaxies. They are 90 million light-years away from us, not 90 million light-years apart.)