This week’s image from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was highlighted by researchers at the University of Bath. It represents three ultra-massive galaxies about the size of our Milky Way from the first billion years of the universe following the Big Bang.
The researchers discuss this in their paper in Nature, Accelerated Formation of Ultra-massive Galaxies in the First Billion Years. The abstract is a bit too technical, but suffice it to say that this is a significant discovery.
As noted in Tech Exporist, Dr. Mengyuan Xiao, lead author of the new study and postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Astronomy at UNIGE Faculty of Science, stated:
These results indicate that galaxies in the early Universe could form stars with unexpected efficiency. As we study these galaxies in more depth, they will offer new insights into the conditions that shaped the Universe’s earliest epochs. The ‘Red Monsters’ are just the beginning of a new era in our exploration of the early Universe.
Our Awesome Universe 