Faint galaxy sheds light on universe's early years

[Omaha Steve]

Source: LA Times

The Hubble Space Telescope has detected light from a small galaxy emitted about 500 million years after the big bang, an early era of the universe about which scientists know relatively little.

By Eryn Brown,

The Hubble Space Telescope has detected light from a small galaxy emitted just 500 million years after the big bang, a crucial and difficult-to-study era when the universe was very young, scientists reported Wednesday.

Scientists were able to see the ancient galaxy because gravity from a massive galaxy cluster situated between it and Hubble acted as a lens, bending the light from the "incredibly faint" galaxy and magnifying it about 15 times, said Johns Hopkins astronomer Wei Zheng.

"The magnification was key," said Zheng, a coauthor of the study published in the journal Nature.

FULL story and photo at link.


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-oldest-galaxy-20120920,0,5590185.story

[daleo]

1. Romney expects to pick up a lo of votes there. N/t

[Uncle Joe]

18. No that's an ancient galaxy and probably for the most part on social security,

it would be part of the 47% that Romney has disowned.

[tomm2thumbs]

2. if light bends, doesn't that imply a slight slowing by shifting its speed tangently?

Oh no, I need wine.

[daleo]

7. No because space is bent

And the path followed by light is therefore straight, in the sense of being the shortest path possible.

[tomm2thumbs]

10. reminds me of a funny question

'I am driving my car at the speed of light and I turn on my headlights. What do I see?'

Makes me admire those scientific thinkers who have the brains that make sense of this stuff!

[Bernardo de La Paz]

12. The same as before: all black because everything ahead is blue shifted off the scale. nt

[tomm2thumbs]

16. ahhhh, now if only I could understand that I'd be so much more satisfied!

but sometimes you have to accept what you don't know in order to learn what can be taught

thnx

[daleo]

17. You could never actually reach the speed of light

According to special relativity, though general relativity may have some loopholes. Even then, your speed would be lower than lightspeed in your local space.

[tomm2thumbs]

19. if I were a Republican I would demand the loopholes

infinite loop-holes I suppose

[mindwalker_i]

9. Light doesn't slow down

It just doesn't. Ever. That's what's so weird about it.

[tomm2thumbs]

11. I guess you are right - warping is different than slowing

but weirder still, yes as you said.. never slows

[Bernardo de La Paz]

13. Light slows down in glass by about 33 %, in water about 25%, etc.

That's how lenses work.

[mindwalker_i]

15. That' an interesting one

If I'm not mistaken, light is absorbed by molecules in glass or other transparent materials and re-emitted. In between molecules it still goes at light speed. So both your statement and mine are correct.

[Corgigal]

3. Paul Ryan

already discovered that.

[bluedigger]

4. When I was a kid we didn't have no new-fangled "gravity".

That's how we walked both ways uphill 10 miles to school and back.

[MNBrewer]

5. But Gawd All Mighty (tm) created the universe 6000 years ago!!!!

The Bible Tells Me So! (tm)

How can something be 500 million light years away from us if Gawd All Mighty (tm) didn't create a universe 6000 years ago with the express intent to fool us into thing He (tm) doesn't exist?

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

20. That's measured in "god-years"

The great turtle measures time at a more stately pace than us mortals.

[Liberalagogo]

6. A long time ago in a galaxy far far away

So, were they able to see Death Star explode?

[lumberjack_jeff]

8. makes you wonder how much of the universe will be forever invisible to us. n/t

[snooper2]

14. And people still credit a god for this

LOL...

Just like still believing this is a credible map