If science fiction flicks have taught us one thing, its that when aliens eventually discover our planet theyll be arriving in flying discs that seem to defy gravity. These mythical flying saucers are a well-worn sci-fi trope, but NASAs trusty Hubble Space Telescope just spotted a flying saucer of its own, only this one is far larger than anything wed want to see visiting Earth.

The image you see above, which was captured by Hubble, shows a galaxy known as IC 2051. As NASA explains in a new blog post, the galaxy is located in the constellation Mensa, and is situated some 85 million light-years from Earth.

The galaxy is huge, stretching its long arms out into space, but its the very center of the galaxy in the image above that reminds us most of a flying saucer.

NASA explains:

This galaxy was observed for a Hubble study ongalactic bulges, the bright round central regions of spiral galaxies.Spiral galaxieslike IC 2051 are shaped a bit like flying saucers when seen from the side; they comprise a thin, flat disk, with a bulky bulge of stars in the center that extends above and below the disk. These bulges are thought to play a key role in how galaxies evolve, and to influence the growth of thesupermassive black holeslurking at the centers of most spirals.

Its observations like this that can teach astronomers a great deal about how other galaxies grow and die. Our understanding of the types of galaxies that are out there in the universe isnt as robust as we might like to believe, and theres still a lot we dont know. Spotting and categorizing different types of galaxies can help us learn more about them while also revealing things about our own home, the Milky Way.

Image Source: ESA/Hubble & NASA, P. Erwin et al.

Link:

NASAs Hubble spots flying saucer, but not the alien kind - BGR