We found a galaxy that is fenced by another galaxy with a Star Wars-like lightsaber
Between two galaxies 28 to 30 billion years away, from which light took 11 billion years to reach us, a galactic war rages on. It’s not between advanced technological civilizations but between two galaxies that are about to merge. They pass through each other and then move further apart over hundreds of millions of years. In the heart of one of them, the supermassive black hole is on a feast. It acquired vast amounts of new gas.
It’s not that unlikely that this dance between the galaxies caused huge gas clouds to move and thicken around the center to provide the food for the supermassive black hole, causing it to become a quasar. It looks like an enormous lightsaber that pierces the other galaxy as they charge at each other.
The piercing beam disrupts the nebulae of the other galaxy. Making the wounded regions incapable of star formation. This kills the other galaxy slowly with all these cuts and piercings. At the same time, the quasar gets more and more food because the merger continues to bring more and more new gas to the hungry black hole.
This cosmic joust occurred when the universe was only 18% of its current age and may be one of the stranger phenomena discovered in the universe so far.