The James Webb Space Telescope has potentially smashed one of its own records again —- if scientists are correct, this trailblazing spacecraft m

James Webb Space Telescope 'pushed to its limits' to see most distant galaxies ever

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2024-11-26 17:30:20

The James Webb Space Telescope has potentially smashed one of its own records again —- if scientists are correct, this trailblazing spacecraft may have glimpsed the earliest galaxies in the universe.

The five galaxy candidates are located so far away that the furthest is seen as it was just 200 million years after the Big Bang. Thus, the light from these galaxies has been traveling to Earth for around 13.6 billion years. Because of the expansion of the universe, these galaxies should now lie a staggering 34 billion light-years away. However, to be clear, none of this is yet confirmed.

Prior to this discovery, made as part of the James Webb Space Telescope's (JWST's) Galactic Legacy Infrared Midplane Survey Extraordinaire (GLIMPSE) project, the most distant galaxy observed by the powerful space telescope was JADES-GS-z14-0. That one was seen as it was when the universe was around 280 million years old.

These new galaxies will be officially named when they are confirmed, but will likely all have the prefix "GLIMPSE" in reference to the survey that uncovered them. These could potentially be the earliest possible galaxies to exist, per our current models of the universe's evolution.

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