The Vig

How cool is this?

This is a spectacular example of a phenomenon called gravitational lensing. It’s caused by the distortion of space-time by massive objects. While formulating his general theory of relativity, Albert Einstein realized that because of this warping, light won’t always travel across the universe in straight lines. For example, if one galaxy lies almost directly behind another as seen from Earth, light from the more distant one will bend around the foreground galaxy and form multiple images — or, in the case of near-perfect alignment, an Einstein ring.

Distortion of space-time?  There’s all kinds of crazy stuff going on out there!

HT: Slog.