NGC 6240 is an ultra luminous infrared galaxy located 400 million light years away in the constellation of Ophiuchus.
The galaxy is the result of a merger between three smaller galaxies. The resulting merger is a single galaxy with three distinct nuclei.
The galaxy has an unusual elongated shape with multiple branches of gas and stars. There are numerous star forming regions triggered by the impact of the galaxy merger.
There are two massive black holes that are moving closer to each other and are only around 3000 light years apart, they will eventually become a single super massive black hole.
The galaxy itself is huge spanning 300,000 light years.
Imaged in LRGB on my Planewave CDK 1000 at Observatorio El Sauce, Chile.
Image acquisition and processing: Mike Selby