Abell S1063 Parallel Field (Frontier Fields)

This collection of galaxies was captured while the Hubble Space Telescope was performing extensive observations of galaxy cluster Abell S1063. As the galaxy cluster was being photographed with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, the telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys stayed trained on this nearby section of sky to create a bonus, parallel deep field image. Afterward, the instrument positions flipped, with the Wide Field Camera 3 observing the parallel field and the Advanced Camera for surveys observing the cluster. These combined observations provided a wealth of information for astronomers. This parallel field was captured as part of Hubble's Frontier Fields project, which used the combined power of natural "gravitational lenses" caused by massive galaxy clusters and Hubble's ability to create long-exposure deep field images to see galaxies that would normally be far beyond the reach of telescopes.