Most distant galaxy ever observed

Los Angeles Times : The youngest and most distant galaxy observed to date could provide further insight into the early universe. EGS-zs8-1, which was found to be just 670 million years old, is much brighter and more active than other distant galaxies. Garth Illingworth of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and colleagues first detected the galaxy while using NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes. But to get a better idea of how far away it actually is, they turned to the MOSFIRE IR spectrograph at the Keck I telescope in Hawaii. By looking for the Lyman-alpha spectral line of hydrogen, the researchers were able to establish the galaxy’s remoteness and derive from that its star mass, star formation rate, and formation epoch. Although almost 13 billion years younger than the Milky Way, EGS-zs8-1 forms stars 80 times faster and has a mass 15% of our galaxy. With the launch of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope in 2018, astronomers hope to find galaxies that are even more distant.