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D.C. Hines, F.J. Low (Steward Observatory), A.S. Evans (SUNY at Stony Brook), R.I. Thompson (Steward Observatory), N.Z. Scoville (CalTech), M.J. Rieke (Steward Observatory)
High fidelity, NICMOS images are presented of a sample of Hyperluminous and ``Warm'' Ultraluminous Infrared Galaxies, each of which has been shown previously to harbor a luminous QSO. The central regions are red and become more compact with increasing wavelength; the objects contain point-like nuclei at 2.1\mum. The host galaxies show tidal distortions, and 80% reveal nearby companions after point-source subtraction. The companions and tidal distortions suggest that interactions are important in the generation of the enormous infrared luminosities.
This work is supported by NASA grant NAG 5-3042. This paper is based on observations with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, obtained at the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. under NASA contract NAS5-26555.