James Webb spots early galaxies similar to our Milky Way

By Georgina Torbet Published January 7, 2023

As the James Webb Space Telescope looks back at some of the earliest galaxies, it is helping us learn not only about galaxies very different from our own but also about how galaxies similar to the Milky Way were first formed. Recently astronomers announced they have used Webb to discover some of the earliest galaxies with a feature called stellar bars, making them similar to our barred spiral galaxy seen today.

A galaxy bar refers to a strip of dust and gas that forms a structure across the center of a galaxy, and which is frequently visible as a bright stripe across a galaxy in images. It is thought that these structures develop as a galaxy ages, as dust and gas are drawn toward the galactic center. So it was remarkable to see a bar in a galaxy from a very early period when the universe was 25% of its current age.

The power of JWST to map galaxies at high resolution and at longer infrared wavelengths than Hubble allows it look through dust and unveil the underlying structure and mass of distant galaxies. This can be seen in these two images of the galaxy EGS23205, seen as it was about 11 billion years ago. In the HST image (left, taken in the near-infrared filter), the galaxy is little more than a disk-shaped smudge obscured by dust and impacted by the glare of young stars, but in the corresponding JWST mid-infrared image (taken this past summer), it’s a beautiful spiral galaxy with a clear stellar bar. — Two images of the galaxy EGS23205, seen as it was about 11 billion years ago. In the HST image (left, taken in the near-infrared filter), the galaxy is little more than a disk-shaped smudge obscured by dust and impacted by the glare of young stars, but in the corresponding JWST mid-infrared image (taken this past summer), it’s a beautiful spiral galaxy with a clear stellar bar. NASA/CEERS/University of Texas at Austin

An earlier image of galaxy EGS23205 taken by Hubble was smudgy and hard to see any structure in, but the new image from Webb shows a bright bar structure much more clearly.

Recommended Videos

“I took one look at these data, and I said, ‘We are dropping everything else!’” said one of the researchers, Shardha Jogee of the University of Texas at Austin, in a statement. “The bars hardly visible in Hubble data just popped out in the JWST image, showing the tremendous power of JWST to see the underlying structure in galaxies.”

Another galaxy, EGS-24268, was also imaged by Webb and is thought to be from 11 billion years ago. Finding these structures in very early galaxies is intriguing as it suggests astronomers will have to adjust their models of how galaxies evolve.

Bars are thought to be important for the development of galaxies as they move gas around and help to provide the building materials for new stars to form.

“Bars solve the supply chain problem in galaxies,” Jogee said. “Just like we need to bring raw material from the harbor to inland factories that make new products, a bar powerfully transports gas into the central region where the gas is rapidly converted into new stars at a rate typically 10 to 100 times faster than in the rest of the galaxy.”

Topics

Tech News

Georgina Torbet

Space Writer

Georgina has been the space writer at Digital Trends space writer for six years, covering human space exploration, planetary…

Space

James Webb is explaining the puzzle of some of the earliest galaxies

This image shows a small portion of the field observed by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) for the Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) survey. It is filled with galaxies. The light from some of them has traveled for over 13 billion years to reach the telescope.

From practically the moment it was turned on, the James Webb Space Telescope has been shaking cosmology. In some of its very earliest observations, the telescope was able to look back at some of the earliest galaxies ever observed, and it found something odd: These galaxies were much brighter than anyone had predicted. Even when the telescope's instruments were carefully calibrated over the few weeks after beginning operations, the discrepancy remained. It seemed like the early universe was a much busier, brighter place than expected, and no one knew why.

This wasn't a minor issue. The fact early galaxies appeared to be bigger or brighter than model predicted meant that something was off about the way we understood the early universe. The findings were even considered "universe breaking." Now, though, new research suggests that the universe isn't broken -- it's just that there were early black holes playing tricks.

Space

Citizen scientists spot mysterious object shooting out of the galaxy at 1 million mph

This artist's concept shows a hypothetical white dwarf, left, that has exploded as a supernova. The object at right is CWISE J1249, a star or brown dwarf ejected from this system as a result of the explosion. This scenario is one explanation for where CWISE J1249 came from.

Citizen scientists have helped to identify an incredibly fast-moving object in space, which is traveling at such a speed that it will shoot out of the Milky Way and head out into intergalactic space.

Amateur astronomers working on the Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project spotted the object, which was also observed by the recently-retired NASA NEOWISE telescope. The trio of citizen scientists -- Martin Kabatnik, Thomas P. Bickle, and Dan Caselden -- spotted the object named CWISE J124909.08+362116.0 several years ago, and now it has been confirmed they are co-authors on a paper about its discovery.

Space

James Webb Telescope captures gorgeous galaxy with a hungry monster at its heart

Featured in this new image from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope is Messier 106, also known as NGC 4258. This is a nearby spiral galaxy that resides roughly 23 million light-years away in the constellation Canes Venatici, practically a neighbour by cosmic standards. Messier 106 is one of the brightest and nearest spiral galaxies to our own and two supernovae have been observed in this galaxy in 1981 and 2014.

A new image from the James Webb Space Telescope shows off a nearby galaxy called Messier 106 -- a spiral galaxy that is particularly bright. At just 23 million light-years away (that's relatively close by galactic standards), this galaxy is of particular interest to astronomers due to its bustling central region, called an active galactic nucleus.

The high level of activity in this central region is thought to be due to the monster that lurks at the galaxy's heart. Like most galaxies including our own, Messier 106 has an enormous black hole called a supermassive black hole at its center. However, the supermassive black hole in Messier 106 is particularly active, gobbling up material like dust and gas from the surrounding area. In fact, this black hole eats so much matter that as it spins, it warps the disk of gas around it, which creates streamers of gas flying out from this central region.