Starburst galaxy

A starburst galaxy is a galaxy with a very high rate of star formation. The rate of star formation is so large that the galaxy will quickly use all of its gas reservoir (from which the stars are made).

The starburst nature of a galaxy is a short phase in a galaxy's evolution, about tens of millions of years. Most starburst galaxies are in the midst of a galaxy merger or at least in a close encounter with another galaxy.

Studying nearby starburst galaxies can help us explore the history of galaxy formation and evolution. Many distant galaxies seen are known to be starbursts, but they are too far away to be studied in any detail.

Starburst galaxies seem to be quite rare in our local universe, and are more common further away. This suggests there were more of them billions of years ago. All galaxies were closer together then, and therefore more likely to be influenced by each other's gravity. More frequent encounters produced more starbursts as galactic forms evolved with the expanding universe.

Notable and well-known starburst galaxies

These include:

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.