This is not just a pretty picture, however – the image packs a lot of scientific information. The authors extract the mass distribution in the cluster (which has implications for cosmological models), measure the mass-to-light ratio of the bright galaxy in the center of the cluster, and use the magnifying power of the lens to search for even more distant galaxies.
The basic idea is to construct a model of the lens, starting with the cluster galaxies and a dark matter halo; then refine the model to reproduce the multiple images that are seen. Using this refined model it’s possible to predict the location of additional images of a given source, and to identify regions of high magnification that can then be examined for multiple images of other sources. Any additional images that are found can be used to further refine the model and so on.
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