Hanny van Arkel, a 25 year old school teacher, was poring over photos of galaxies on the Internet last August when she stumbled across a strange object in the night sky: a bright, gaseous mass with a gaping hole in its middle.

Van Arkel posted a query on the Web site of the Galaxy Zoo project, which encourages members of the public to join in astronomy research online.

Galaxy Zoo astronomers are now researching what may be a new class of astronomical object.

Click here to read more about this mysterious vortex and how you can be an astronomer on-line.

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