Analysis of 4,000 James Webb Telescope images
U.S. researchers say the early universe was not circular but shaped like an elongated banana
Analysis of 4,000 James Webb Telescope images
(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Kim Yeon-sook = After analyzing images taken with the James Webb Space Telescope and reproducing them in 3D, research results showed that the early galaxies had an elongated shape like a banana.
This claim differs from the existing theory that new galaxies were circular or disk-shaped, which are often seen in the modern universe.
According to the American daily New York Times (NYT) on the 5th (local time), American researchers, including Columbia University postdoctoral researcher Viraji Pandya, published a paper in an academic journal containing an analysis of about 4,000 images of new galaxies taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. It has been submitted to the Astrophysical Journal and will be published soon.
The Webb Telescope, currently the highest-spec space telescope, can observe the most distant galaxies, that is, the earliest galaxies, by capturing distant wavelengths through cosmic dust and gas clouds with a huge mirror and infrared sensor.
The researchers statistically analyzed images obtained from the multinational research project ‘Space Evolution Early Emission Science Survey’ (CEERS) and presented them in three dimensions.
In the modern universe, galaxies appear in two forms: elliptical and elongated disk-shaped.
The researchers believed that if early galaxies were balls or disk-shaped with random orientation in space, the front of the circle should have been revealed when viewed through a telescope.
Rather, the researchers’ tentative conclusion is that linear shapes of pickles, cigars, surfboards, and bananas were visible.
These elongated galaxies accounted for 80% of the galaxies in the CEERS data, dating back about 500 million years after the Big Bang.
Dr. Pandya told the NYT that the results were surprising and unexpected, although they took their cue from previous research using the Hubble Telescope.
The NYT reported that if the results of this study are accepted by academia, it could fundamentally change our understanding of the emergence and growth process of galaxies.
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Kim Yeon-sook