"Webb" looked at the most distant galaxy in the Universe. She has an abnormal weight

An international team of astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to obtain

images of the galaxy GN-z11 in the nearinfrared range. This is one of the most distant objects known to date. The observations provided scientists with important information about the morphology and environment of GN-z11.

The object's redshift is approximately10.6, size is about 4,000 ± 2,000 light years, and stellar mass is 1.3 billion Suns. Scientists are now observing the galaxy as it existed 13.4 billion years ago, just 430 million years after the Big Bang.

GN-z11 is a particularly bright galaxywhich is home to young stars about 90 million years old (for comparison, the age of the Sun is 4.6 billion years). It is noteworthy that the galaxy has an anomalously large stellar mass for such a young age, which suggests its rapid growth.

Also, the brightness of the GN-z11 allows you to observeeven with the use of ground-based observatories. However, a team of astronomers led by Sandro Taccella of the University of Cambridge, UK, studied the galaxy using the James Webb Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam). The observation campaign was carried out as part of the Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES) program.

Area around GN-z11. Credit: Tacchella et al. 2023

Studying the properties of the most distant galaxies hascritical to expanding scientists' knowledge of the early stages of formation and evolution, including the formation of the first stars and black holes. Astronomers perceive such galaxies as probes for a number of baryonic processes, structure formation, and the nature of dark matter.

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Cover: GN-z11 superimposed on image from GOODS-North survey

Authors: NASA, ESA, P. Oesch (Yale University), G. Brammer (STScI), P. van Dokkum (Yale University) and G. Illingworth (University of California, Santa Cruz)