Astronomers discover farthest baby blue galaxyMay 6, 2015 - 10:27 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - Astronomers have discovered a baby blue galaxy that is farther away in distance and time than any galaxy ever seen. It's among the universe's first generation of galaxies, from 13.1 billion years ago, the Associated Press reports. Yale and University of California Santa Cruz scientists used three different telescopes to spot and then calculate the age of the blurry infant galaxy. By measuring how the light has shifted, they determined the galaxy, called EGS-zs8-1, is from about 670 million years after the Big Bang. Because when astronomers look farther away from Earth, they are looking back further in time, this is both the most distant galaxy and the furthest back in time. It's 13.1 billion light-years away, in the constellation Bootes. A light-year is 5.8 trillion miles. This beats the old record by about 30 million years, which isn't much, but was difficult to achieve, said astronomer Garth Illingworth of the University of California Santa Cruz, who co-authored the paper in Astrophysical Journal Letters announcing the discovery. The photo they took was from a crucial time in the early universe, after what was called the Dark Ages, when galaxies and stars were just starting to form and the universe was only one five hundredth the mass it is now, Illingworth said. This galaxy — larger than most of the others from that time, which is why astronomers using the most powerful telescopes can see it now — was probably only about 100 million years old, but it was quite busy, Illingworth said. "We're looking here at an infant that's growing at a great rate," he said. The galaxy was giving birth to stars at 80 times the rate our Milky Way does now. "These objects would like nothing like our sun. It would look much, much bluer." Yale astronomer Pascal Oesch was looking through Hubble Space Telescope images in 2013 when he saw a bright object. He then used the Spitzer space telescope to see it again. The hardest work was confirming the age and distance using the ground-based Keck Observatory in Hawaii to separate light waves. Top stories Yerevan will host the 2024 edition of the World Congress On Information Technology (WCIT). Rustam Badasyan said due to the lack of such regulation, the state budget is deprived of VAT revenues. Krisp’s smart noise suppression tech silences ambient sounds and isolates your voice for calls. Gurgen Khachatryan claimed that the "illegalities have been taking place in 2020." Partner news Most popular in the section | Scholz hopes Armenia-Azerbaijan peace treaty will be signed this year German Chancellor Olaf Scholz hopes that a peace treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan will be signed this year. Armenia, Russia discuss life extension of Metsamor nuclear plant Issues regarding the extension of life of the 2nd power unit of the Armenian Nuclear Power Plant were discussed in Yerevan. Armenians stage more campaigns against territorial concessions to Azerbaijan Protesters blocked more roads across Armenia on Friday, April 26 in continuing attempts to scuttle territorial concessions to Azerbaijan. Czech-Armenian military cooperation discussed in Yerevan A delegation led by the Director General for the Industrial Cooperation Division of the Ministry of Defence of the Czech Republic visited Armenia. |