Where In The Universe Challenge #104

It’s time once again for another Where In The Universe Challenge. Test your visual knowledge of the cosmos by naming where in the Universe this image was taken and give yourself extra points if you can name the telescope responsible for this picture. Post your guesses in the comments section, and check back on later at this same post to find the answer. This week’s WITU challenge was submitted by UT reader, the Hon. Salacious B. Crumb — thanks Salicious! To make this challenge fun for everyone, please don’t include links or extensive explanations with your answer. Good luck!

UPDATE: The answer has now been posted below.

This might be a WITU first. No one got the right answer! (although Jon came close…)

This is NGC 7702, a very unusual ring galaxy found in the southern constellation Phoenix, (at 23h 35m 29.1s ?56deg 00′ 45″). Lots of telescopes have taken images of this object, but this image if from the European Southern Observatory, and you can see the image here. This abstract from R. Buta at the University of Alabama describes the galaxy as, “NGC 7702 is found to be a true S0(+) galaxy with a bright high-contrast inner ring and a faint low-contrast outer ring; the inner ring is significantly elongated relative to typical SB inner rings and has colors which suggest a burst of star formation less than 2 Gyr ago.”

Thanks again — and kudos — to the Hon. Salacious B. Crumb for sending in this image, which seems to have stumped everyone this week!

Check back next week for another WITU challenge!