This infrared image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (also called Webb or JWST) was taken by the NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) for the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey, or JADES, program. The NIRCam data were used to determine which galaxies needed to be studied further with spectroscopic observations. One such galaxy, JADES-GS-z14-0 (shown in the pull-out image), was found to have a redshift of 14.32 (+0.08/-0.20), making it the current record holder is for the most distant known galaxy. This corresponds to a time less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Brant Robertson (UC Santa Cruz), Ben Johnson (CfA), Sandro Tacchella (Cambridge), Phill Cargile (CfA)
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This infrared image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (also called Webb or JWST) was taken by the NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) for the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey, or JADES, program. The NIRCam data were used to determine which galaxies needed to be studied further with spectroscopic observations. One such galaxy, JADES-GS-z14-0 (shown in the pull-out image), was found to have a redshift of 14.32 (+0.08/-0.20), making it the current record holder is for the most distant known galaxy. This corresponds to a time less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Brant Robertson (UC Santa Cruz), Ben Johnson (CfA), Sandro Tacchella (Cambridge), Phill Cargile (CfA)
An international team of astronomers today announced the discovery of the two earliest and farthest galaxies ever seen, dating back just 300 million years after the Big Bang. These results, using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), mark an important milestone in the study of the early universe.
The discoveries were made by the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES) team. Daniel Eisenstein of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA) is one of the JADES team leaders and principal investigator of the observation program that revealed these galaxies. Ben Johnson and Phillip Cargile, both research scientists at CfA, and Zihao Wu, a Ph.D. from Harvard. student at CfA, also played an important role.
Due to the expansion of the universe, light from distant galaxies stretches to longer wavelengths as it travels. This effect is so extreme for these two galaxies that their ultraviolet light is shifted to infrared wavelengths where only JWST can see it. Because light takes time to travel, more distant galaxies are also seen as they were earlier in time.
The two record-breaking galaxies are named JADES-GS-z14-0 and JADES-GS-z14-1, with the former being the more distant of the two. The JADES-GS-z14-0 is not only the new distance record holder, but also stands out for its size and brightness.
“The size of the galaxy clearly proves that most of its light is produced by large numbers of young stars,” says Eisenstein, a Harvard professor and chairman of the astronomy department, “rather than material deposited on a supermassive black hole in the universe.” galaxies fall. center, which would appear much smaller.”
The combination of the extreme brightness and the fact that young stars are fueling this high brightness makes JADES-GS-z14-0 the most striking evidence yet found for the rapid formation of large, massive galaxies in the early Universe.
“JADES-GS-z14-0 is now becoming the archetype of this phenomenon,” says Dr. Stefano Carniani of the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, lead author of the discovery paper. “It’s amazing that the universe can create such a galaxy in just 300 million years.”
Scientists used the NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to acquire a spectrum of the distant galaxy JADES-GS-z14-0 to accurately measure its redshift and thus determine its age. The redshift can be determined based on the location of a critical wavelength known as the Lyman-alpha break. This galaxy dates back less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI)
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Scientists used the NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to acquire a spectrum of the distant galaxy JADES-GS-z14-0 to accurately measure its redshift and thus determine its age. The redshift can be determined based on the location of a critical wavelength known as the Lyman-alpha break. This galaxy dates back less than 300 million years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI)
Evidence for surprisingly powerful early galaxies appeared even in the first JWST images and has continued to grow over the first two years of the mission. This trend runs counter to the expectations most astronomers had about theories of galaxy formation before the launch of JWST.
JADES-GS-z14-0 was a puzzle for the JADES team when they first saw it over a year ago, because it appears so close to a foreground galaxy in the sky that the team couldn’t be sure the two were not neighbors. But in October 2023, the JADES team performed even deeper imaging – five full days with the JWST Near-Infrared Camera on just one field – using filters designed to better isolate the earliest galaxies.
“We simply couldn’t see any plausible way to explain this galaxy as just a neighbor of the more nearby galaxy,” says Dr. Kevin Hainline, research professor at the University of Arizona.
The galaxy is located in a field where the JWST Mid-Infrared Instrument had performed an ultra-deep observation. Its brightness at mid-infrared wavelengths is a sign of emission by hydrogen and even oxygen atoms in the early universe.
“Despite being so young, the galaxy is already hard at work creating the elements we know on Earth,” said Zihao Wu, co-author of a second paper on this finding, led by Jakob Helton, a graduate student at university. of Arizona.
Encouraged, the team then collected a spectrum from each galaxy and confirmed their hopes that JADES-GS-z14-0 was indeed a record-breaking galaxy and that the fainter candidate, JADES-GS-z14-1, was almost as distant. .
A third paper led by Brant Robertson, professor at the University of California-Santa Cruz, and Ben Johnson, studies the evolution of this early galaxy population.
“This amazing object shows that galaxy formation in the early Universe was very rapid and intense,” says Johnson, “and JWST will allow us to find more of these galaxies, perhaps when the Universe was younger. It’s a great opportunity to study this. how galaxies form.”
All three articles are currently available on the arXiv preprint server.
More information:
A radiant cosmic dawn: spectroscopic confirmation of two luminous galaxies at z∼14, arXiv:2405.18485 [astro-ph.GA] arxiv.org/abs/2405.18485
JWST/MIRI photometric detection at 7.7 μm of the stellar continuum and nebular emission in a galaxy at z>14, arXiv:2405.18462 [astro-ph.GA] arxiv.org/abs/2405.18462
Brant Robertson et al., Earliest galaxies in the JADES Origins field: luminosity function and cosmic star formation rate density 300 million years after the Big Bang, arXiv (2023). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2312.10033
Magazine information:
arXiv