The Oldest And Furthest Galaxy
If you are going to log in every day and take a look at space exploration, you will inevitably realize that wonders are discovered on a regular basis. Today is one of those days in which the discovery breaks many boundaries because scientist believe that they might have discovered the oldest and furthest galaxy to date. Humans can take great comfort in this discovery, but it also helps many questions re-emerge.
It is very difficult for us to contemplate the sheer length and age of the Universe. While it is very beautiful, it can strike fear into our hearts at the same time. The entire Universe is thought to be 13.8 billion years old and now we found a galaxy which scientists believe is more than 13.2 billion years old. As far as we can tell, this old and distant place might have seen it all: from the beginning until now.
The galaxy was named EGS8p7, a rather uniniteresting name for the majority of humans, but this galaxy might host other beings like you or I. Those beings might have been aware of our existence far before we discovered them and they might have technology that surpasses ours by centuries or millennia. Or it could be as cold and empty as the space we have known for years.
EGS8p7 was originally discovered by a Californian group of scientists who considered, at the time, that this area was nothing more than just another dot in space that could be explored later in time. NASA gathered data about the galaxy via their Spitzer Space Telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope. The California Institute of Technology mentioned that the discovery was made while researchers were looking for primitive objects in the universe.
The discovery has challenged some of the theories that implied a very dark initial universe. According to the researchers, the newly discovered galaxy is bright, brighter than expected and it is believed that the lingering darkness lasted for only one billion years. This leads us to believe that light has spread throughout EGS8p7 in the following 12.2 billion years, making it the bright Christmas tree that it is now.
While the discovery only reveals unexplored parts of the Universe until now, it might be of further use in the future, when we will most likely possess more advanced technology to study it further. And who knows, maybe one day we are going to be able to think about visiting it.
Photo Credits dailytimesgazette.com
