Artist’s impression of gravitational lensing of a distant merger

This artist’s impression shows how the effect of gravitational lensing by an intervening galaxy magnifies, brightens and distorts the appearance of a remote merging galaxy far behind it. The viewpoint of the observer moves sideways so that that the distant galaxy merger appears first to one side, where it is faint, and then appears right behind the foreground object and is dramatically magnified and its total apparent brightness increases. More information and download options: