Hubble Pinpoints Farthest Protocluster of Galaxies Ever Seen
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 - 12:02
in Astronomy & Space
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has uncovered a cluster of galaxies in the initial stages of construction -- the most distant such grouping ever observed in the early universe. In a random sky survey made in near-infrared light, Hubble spied five tiny galaxies clustered together 13.1 billion light-years away. They are among the brightest galaxies at that epoch and very young, existing just 600 million years after the universe's birth in the big bang.