Revealing the 'time-traveling' galaxy from where the universe began

The James Webb Space Telescope has captured one of the most incredible images yet of a galactic world 13.1 billion years ago.

According to SciTech Daily, the object that James Webb just discovered is an ancient galaxy that is forming stars vigorously in the outer regions, located in the middle of the universe just 700 million years after the Big Bang.

The galaxy, called NGC 1549, is 100 times smaller than our Milky Way galaxy, but it was surprisingly mature for such an early stage in the universe.

However, the way it is developing is most unusual.

Galaxies in the early universe may have had very different structures and formations than they do today - (Illustration by AI: ANH THU).

According to a research team led by Dr. Sandro Tacchella from the Cavendish Laboratory of Cambridge University (UK), like a large city, this "time-traveling" galaxy from more than 13 billion years ago has a dense core of stars but becomes sparser in the "suburbs".

Just like how a city grows, it is gradually expanding by accelerating star formation in its "suburbs" , creating "satellite cities".

It's a completely opposite evolution to today's galaxies, which evolve through two main mechanisms.

One is that they begin when gas clouds collapse under their own gravity, forming very dense stellar cores and possibly black holes, which continually pull in gas and dust to become star-forming material.

As the galaxy grows larger, star formation increases, it gathers momentum and spins faster and faster, forming a spiral or disk shape.

So the main mechanism is still to pull material from the outside in to form stars inside. This is completely opposite to the way to create star-forming regions on the outskirts that NGC 1549 used to grow.

Real image of NGC 1549 - (Photo: NASA/ESA/CSA).

The second most common way is for galaxies to grow by merging with other galaxies, much like our Milky Way has swallowed about 20 or so "victims" during its lifetime.

According to the authors, star formation in the same way that ancient NGC 1549 did has been discussed in astronomical theories. But this is the first time actual evidence has emerged.

In addition, NGC 1549 exhibits many other very interesting features.

NGC 1549 doubles its stellar mass in the outer regions about every 10 million years. That's a staggering rate. For comparison, our Milky Way galaxy only doubles its mass every 10 billion years.

The density of the galaxy's core, as well as its high star formation rate, suggests that at the time of observation this young galaxy was rich in the gas needed to form new stars.

This may say a lot about the early cosmic environment in which it was born and existed when James Webb captured it.

Scientists say they are still trying to find more galaxies "in the same age" as this ancient object to find out if other galaxies formed in the same "unusual" way.