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The galaxy cluster SDSS J1038+4849 is pictured in this undated handout image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. As a result of the phenomenon of gravitational lensing, it seems to be smiling. In the case of this “happy face”, the two eyes are very bright galaxies and the smile lines are actually arcs caused by strong gravitational lensing.
Galaxy clusters are the most massive structures in the Universe and exert such a powerful gravitational pull that they warp the spacetime around them and act as cosmic lenses which can magnify, distort and bend the light behind them. This phenomenon, crucial to many of Hubble's discoveries, can be explained by Einstein's theory of general relativity. (Photo by Reuters/NASA)
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