Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have discovered four of the oldest galaxies in the universe, forming stars much faster than previously thought.
A sample of thousands of galaxies at different ages observed by the James Webb Space Telescope.
Astronomers utilizing the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have recently identified four of the farthest galaxies ever seen, located over 13 billion light-years away from Earth.
This means that astronomers are observing what galaxies looked like just 300 to 500 million years after the Big Bang, during the early stages of the universe’s nearly 14 billion-year history.
Some recent studies had claimed the potential discovery of even older galaxies using JWST in the past few months. However, these four newly discovered galaxies are distinct, and astronomers have truly confirmed that they are ancient galaxies, not another celestial body or a nearby galaxy masquerading as a more distant one.
These four galaxies exist during the period of reionization, a time when astronomers believe the first stars were formed. After confirming the age of the galaxies, researchers measured the sizes of the stars within these galaxies and found them to be quite small, at least compared to our Milky Way galaxy. However, these galaxies are also producing stars at a rapid rate—a “surprisingly early occurrence in the universe,” said co-author Stéphane Charlot, a researcher at the Institute of Astrophysics of Paris.
According to the researchers, these galaxies also seem to lack any particularly complex elements, indicating that their stars have not had time to create heavier elements. Instead, they are composed of hydrogen and helium atoms from the early universe.