NASA’s James Webb captures amazing image of the second-most distant galaxy from Earth

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has captured an image of a galaxy about 33 billion light-years from Earth — the second furthest the telescope has seen.

The newly discovered system was located in a region of space known as Pandora’s Cluster, or Abell 27, where several already massive galaxies cluster to form a massive cluster so massive that their gravity distorts spacetime around them.

Astronomers from Pennsylvania State University estimate that the light detected by the James Webb Space Telescope emanated from the galaxy Z-13 when the universe was about 330 million years old, and traveled about 13.4 billion light-years to reach the James Webb Space Telescope.

But the researchers said that the galaxy is currently closer to 33 billion light-years from our planet due to the expansion of the universe during this period.

“Very little is known about the early universe, and the only way to learn about that time and test our theories about the formation and growth of early galaxies is through these very distant galaxies,” said first author Bingyi Wang.

“Before our analysis, we knew of only three confirmed galaxies at this extreme distance.

“Studying these new galaxies and their properties has revealed the diversity of galaxies in the early universe and how much we can learn from them.”

The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered a second ancient galaxy, Z-12, the fourth most distant galaxy ever seen.

“The light from these galaxies is ancient, about three times older than Earth,” said Joel Leija, an assistant professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State.

“These early galaxies are like lighthouses, light bursting through the very thin hydrogen gas that makes up the early universe.

“Only with their light can we begin to understand the strange physics that ruled the galaxy near cosmic dawn.”

Z-13 and Z-12 are found within the Pandora Cluster, which was formed by the accretion of four galaxies 350 million years ago.

The newly discovered system was discovered in a region of space known as the Pandora Cluster, or Abell 27, where several massive galaxies are already clustered to form a supercluster so large that its gravity distorts spacetime around it.

The James Webb Space Telescope has discovered a second ancient galaxy, Z-12, the fourth most distant galaxy ever seen.

The team also noted that both galaxies are much larger than those observed at great distances.

One is at least six times larger and is about 2,000 light-years across, much smaller than our Milky Way Galaxy, which is 100,000 light-years across.

The smaller size is likely due to the early universe being more compact than it is today, hindering the growth of ancient galaxies, Wang explained.

“Galaxies previously discovered at these distances are point sources. They appear as a dot in our images,” Wang said.

“But one of ours looks elongated, almost like a peanut, and the other looks like a thin ball. It’s not clear whether the difference in size is due to how the stars formed or what happened to them after they formed, but the diversity in the properties of galaxies is really interesting.”

“These early galaxies are expected to have formed from similar materials, but they show signs of being very different from each other.”

The James Webb Space Telescope discovered 60,000 light sources in the Pandora cluster in 2022, the telescope’s first year of operations.

The Uncover team went to work narrowing down the light sources to 700 candidates, eight of which could be among the first galaxies created after the Big Bang 13.8 billion years ago.

A deeper analysis of Z-13 and Z-12 revealed that the two had little minerals but were growing rapidly as active storms formed.

Liga said the first elements were formed in the cores of early stars through the process of fusion.

“It stands to reason that these early galaxies do not contain heavy elements such as metals because they were among the first factories to build those heavy elements.

“Of course, they would have to be young and stars would form to form the first galaxies, but confirming these properties is an important fundamental test of our models and helps confirm the full model of the Big Bang theory.”