The Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington 813 Santa Barbara Street, Pasadena, CA 91101, USA Abstract. Gravitational interactions and mergers are shaping and reshaping galaxies throughout the observable universe. While observations of interacting galaxies at low redshifts yield detailed information about the processes at work, observations at high redshifts suggest that interactions and mergers were much more frequent in the past. Major mergers of nearby disk galaxies form remnants that share many properties with ellipticals and are, in essence, present-day protoellipticals. There is also tantalizing evidence that minor mergers of companions may help build bulges in disk galaxies.
Gas plays a crucial role in such interactions.
Because of its dissipative nature, it tends to get crunched into molecular form, turning into fuel for starbursts and active nuclei. Galaxy formation and transformation clearly is a prolonged process occurring to the present time. Overall, the currently available observational evidence points towards Hubble's morphological sequence being mainly a sequence of decreasing merger damage.