The discovery has left astronomers at Cornell University in wonder.
Analyzing the data of the first image captured by NASA’s JWST (James Webb Space Telescope) of a popular early galaxy, astronomers at Cornell University were surprised by the blob of light shining near the galaxy’s outer edge.
While scanning the image, the initial focus and target of the infrared observatory was SPT0418-47, one of the brightest dusty, star-creating galaxies in the early universe. Its distant light bent and magnified into a circle (Einstein ring) by the gravity of a foreground galaxy.
However, when the astronomers took a deeper look into previous JWST data, a serendipitous discovery was produced: a companion galaxy previously overshadowed by the light of the foreground galaxy. As per estimates made by researchers, the galaxy is about 1.4 billion years old. Despite its young age, the galaxy has surprisingly hosted multiple generations of stars.
Metal-rich galaxies in the early universe
“We found this galaxy to be super-chemically abundant, something none of us expected,” said Bo Peng in a press release, who is a doctoral student in astronomy and led the data analysis. “JWST changes the way we view this system and opens up new venues to study how stars and galaxies formed in the early universe.”
The paper’s second author, Amit Vishwas said earlier images captured by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) of the same galaxy hinted towards the companion galaxy, which JSWT confirmed. However, nothing more than random noises could be interpreted.
Considering their mass and age, the most surprising feature of these two galaxies was their mature metallicity—amounts of elements like carbon, oxygen and nitrogen that are heavier than Hydrogen and Helium —which is quite similar to the sun.
"We are seeing the leftovers of at least a couple of generations of stars having lived and died within the first billion years of the universe's existence, which is not what we typically see," Vishwas explained.
"We speculate that the process of forming stars in these galaxies must have been very efficient and started very early in the universe, particularly to explain the measured abundance of nitrogen relative to oxygen, as this ratio is a reliable measure of how many generations of stars have lived and died."
“We’re still working on this galaxy,” Peng said. “There’s more to explore in this data.”
The full study was published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters and can be found here.
1 Comments
I am very happy to hear that some people are surprised at least.
ReplyDeleteFor me it is indicative such people do not understand how stars and galaxies are created.
The universe is based on electromagnetic energy, which I understand to be the motivational force of the universe.
There are four states of matter, solid, liquid, gaseous and plasma.
I consider plasma to be the primary state of matter and still is between 95 and 99% of matter in the universe.
The trick is converting that primary state of matter to one of the other three states of matter. What is available, and is happening continuously is the process seen, but not understood by gravitationalists, in the Z-pinch of a Birkeland Current.
In the Z-pinch is a toroid and it is formed from the plasma formerly flowing, resistance free, through a Birkeland Current. If you have seen what some people call the "hour-glass" shape, then you are seeing the transition from the BC to the Z-pinch. Previously a resistance free pathway becomes constrained by the taper. As soon as the taper begins, light is emitted from reactions between the positive and negative particles of the plasma. The results are very specific, a ring feature is produced marking the start of the taper. As the taper increases more and more light is to be seen, this illuminates the shape of the taper, producing the hour-glass shape on both sides of the Z-pinch. At the Z-pinch there is an extremely bright light. This is where billions of reactions are going on and will continue to go on.
The torroid should properly be called a plasmoid because it is formed by the plasma formerly travelling through the BC.
The product of the reactions is atoms, no particular atoms have priority over any other, if the positive and negative components of a particular atom meet, collide or embrace then such an atom will be made.
One of the interesting aspects of the plasmoid is that it a limit to the amount of electromagnetic energy it can handle and just like a man made capacitor it overloads. The man made capacitor discharges, but the plasmoid has a better way of coping, it splits by parthenogenisis. It creates a baby, so to speak, plasmoid. Both now are able to
cope with the volume of electromagnetic energy.
However, as the volume builds again an overcapacity condition happens again. Another parthenogenisis occurs, this time both plasmoids will be involved.
Imagine that process happening time after time, we could have quite a family of plasmoids, which should now be called proto-stars.
Demands elsewhere on the electromagnetic energy will reduce the need for all the proto-stars and the connection to the BC will be lost to almost all the newly formed entities. Internal tentative connections between the proto-stars become the most important links between the entities that have lost their connection with the BC. Electromagnetic energy will from now on will be supplied by the remaining proto-star(s).
What we now have it a structure akin to our solar system, with a single or multiple stars passing on BC current to the non-stars within their system.
The glow of the plasmoid, flaring outward with nothing of note(as far as I can tell) happening in the centre means that what was called a black hole in prehistoric times is now revealed to be a plasmoid.
So we have made a complete family out of the fourth state of matter, we know how it was done and what the facilitator was. That family now exists but what are its intentions for the future. Obviously, it has none it will just continue to exist, the planets will consist of solids, liquids and gas, probably sorted into that order.
Each planet having a waterery surface with the lightest type of rock forming a continuous crust over progressively denser rock. If we know of a planet that does not meet that description, we have the right to assume that something external to the process of their creation must have happened.