Thursday, December 22, 2011

NASA Telescopes Help Find Rare Galaxy at Dawn of Time

Distant Galaxy Bursts with Stars This image shows one of the most distant galaxies known, called GN-108036, dating back to 750 million years after the Big Bang that created our universe. The galaxy's light took 12.9 billion years to reach us. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/STScI/University of Tokyo
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December 21, 2011
Astronomers using NASA's Spitzer and Hubble space telescopes have discovered that one of the most distant galaxies known is churning out stars at a shockingly high rate. The blob-shaped galaxy, called GN-108036, is the brightest galaxy found to date at such great distances.

The galaxy, which was discovered and confirmed using ground-based telescopes, is 12.9 billion light-years away. Data from Spitzer and Hubble were used to measure the galaxy's high star production rate, equivalent to about 100 suns per year. For reference, our Milky Way galaxy is about five times larger and 100 times more massive than GN-108036, but makes roughly 30 times fewer stars per year.
MORE: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-392&cid=release_2010-392&msource=11392&tr=y&auid=10061865

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