Space telescope discovers 'teenage' galaxies

Beyond star-gazing is galaxy-gazing. And the James Webb Space Telescope is turning out to be good at the job. Launched in 2021, the American space telescope placed in a strategic spot compared to terrestrial telescopes, and also the other space telescope Chandra, began looking the farthest into the universe, which meant looking at the earliest period of the universe, nearer to the Big Bang, the grand explosion that marked the emergence of the universe about 13.8 billion years ago. But soon, the hunt for the earliest galaxies became blurred a bit. So now the exciting part has turned out to be what researchers call 'teenage galaxies', which formed two to three billion years after the Big Bang. These galaxies are not fully formed, that is their final shape is not yet certain. We do not know whether they would become spiral galaxies like the Milky Way, which is the galaxy of which the earth and the solar system are a part.

 The temperatures of stars forming in the 23 galaxies they have tracked show certain characteristics, and the stars that are being formed in these galaxies burn at a higher temperature of 24,000 degrees Farhenheit or 13,350 degrees Celsius which is higher than in other galaxies. The elements found in these teenage galaxies are hydrogen, helium, oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur, argon, silicon and nickel. Scientists find the presence of nickel surprising because this element is invisible in nearby stars. It means that the stars are burning so intensely that even nickel glows.

The observations of the Webb Space Telescope are expanding the understanding of the universe, but scientists admit that what is known of these distant galaxies, of their evolution, is still hazy and what can be gleaned about them is very limited. It is that the view captured of these galaxies do not as yet offer a very clear picture, and what can be inferred about them is as yet unclear. But researchers hope that they will be understand better the teenage galaxies as they make fresh discoveries.

Cosmology or the study of the universe is an exciting field, which interests both the layperson and the researcher. While the researcher is looking avidly for the details, what excites the layperson is the unfolding of the universe through the galaxies which are spreading out and unfold the picture of the unfolding universe. So while the discoveries about galaxies, the star systems might leave the researcher unsatisfied, it feeds the curiosity of the layperson and fires his or her imagination.

Discoveries in cosmology are difficult to prove. Albert Einstein was fortunate that his theory of relativity had predicted the bending of light which was proved during a solar eclipse and the light ray was found to be bending over Mercury. It is only recently that Stephen Hawking's theory of black hole radiation was confirmed when two black holes collided. But generally, it is difficult to get observational confirmation of cosmological theories. But cosmology remains an exciting part of physics, as interesting and perhaps more interesting part of modern physics. It is the telescope that has thrown open the doors of the universe as it were.

First it was Galileo who looked through his telescope at the crater-marked surface of the moon. Cosmology has come a long way from the 17th century of Galileo. Today, the space telescope offers a deeper view of the universe. And if the scientists are to be believed what we know of the universe even with the help of the most powerful and better placed telescopes is much too little. What remains to be known remains much too large. The scientists are aware of this. And they make their strongest effort to penetrate deeper into the universe. Like the teenage galaxies that have been discovered, the scientists are teenagers too still far from formulating their view of the universe based on hard evidence.