13.2 billion year-old galaxy found in 13.8 billion year old universe. :0

Should we be able to see this old galaxy? Amazing

The galaxy is called EGS8p7. We may still find something older...or younger depending how you look at it.
They determined age by spectrographic analysis of the galaxy to determine its redshift which is used to measure distance to galaxies. Redshift is hard to use for the universe's most distant objects, but further into the article it explains how the age and distance was determined.

Redshift results from the Doppler effect, the same phenomenon that causes the siren on a fire truck to drop in pitch as the truck passes. With celestial objects, however, it is light that is being "stretched" rather than sound; instead of an audible drop in tone, there is a shift from the actual color to redder wavelengths.

Immediately after the Big Bang, the universe was a soup of charged particles—electrons and protons—and light (photons). Because these photons were scattered by free electrons, the early universe could not transmit light. By 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe had cooled enough for free electrons and protons to combine into neutral hydrogen atoms that filled the universe, allowing light to travel through the cosmos. Then, when the universe was just a half-billion to a billion years old, the first galaxies turned on and reionized the neutral gas. The universe remains ionized today.

It maybe one of our universes first Nurseries

So why can we see this early/old galaxy? They detected it using the MOSFIRE spectrometer.

Prior to reionization, however, clouds of neutral hydrogen atoms would have absorbed certain radiation emitted by young, newly forming galaxies—including the so-called Lyman-alpha line, the spectral signature of hot hydrogen gas that has been heated by ultraviolet emission from new stars, and a commonly used indicator of star formation.

Because of this absorption, it should not, in theory, have been possible to observe a Lyman-alpha line from EGS8p7.

"If you look at the galaxies in the early universe, there is a lot of neutral hydrogen that is not transparent to this emission," says Zitrin. "We expect that most of the radiation from this galaxy would be absorbed by the hydrogen in the intervening space. Yet still we see Lyman-alpha from this galaxy."

A MOSFIRE spectrometer captures the chemical signatures of everything from stars to the distant galaxies at near-infrared wavelengths (0.97-2.45 microns, or millionths of a meter).

Researches suspect the stars may be "special" in this galaxy.

"The galaxy we have observed, EGS8p7, which is unusually luminous, may be powered by a population of unusually hot stars, and it may have special properties that enabled it to create a large bubble of ionized hydrogen much earlier than is possible for more typical galaxies at these times," says Sirio Belli, a Caltech graduate student who worked on the project.

www.caltech.edu...

Good find and a really interesting read. Maybe when we have better equipment we will find things even older that will cause us to revise our estimate of the universes age.

Nice to see a thread on here that won't lead to childish bickering.

a reply to: zazzafrazz

Immediately after the Big Bang, the universe was a soup of charged particles—electrons and protons—and light (photons). Because these photons were scattered by free electrons, the early universe could not transmit light. By 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe had cooled enough for free electrons and protons to combine into neutral hydrogen atoms that filled the universe, allowing light to travel through the cosmos. Then, when the universe was just a half-billion to a billion years old, the first galaxies turned on and reionized the neutral gas. The universe remains ionized today.

what a fantastic fairytale. Very entertaining.

a reply to: expatwhite

Nice to see a thread on here that won't lead to childish bickering.

Haha, cute. Too bad, the universe is only 5000 years old, and the devil done put those galaxies up there to fools ya, much as he put those dinosaur bones down there to make people atheistic evolutionists... I heard Michio Kaku say that sometime.

a reply to: zazzafrazz

What amazes me is that humans have this idea that they can somehow put a date and time on anything with so much certainty when time itself is a human construct, not only that, but why does it matter how old the universe is or anything for that matter?

EGS8P7?

EGS8(p7)

EGS8

Exit

It must be pretty close to the center of the universe right? You know, because it's expanding and all outward..

Pretty cool. What amazes me is our inability to accurately date historical things here on earth but something million of lightyears away, simple. Damn Mother Nature!

a reply to: MarioOnTheFly

OK, why is it a fairytale? Please can you expand a little and say why this is wrong? I am far from an expert so an alternative theory would be welcome and honestly considered.

As long as it's not "God" did it in 6 days I would genuinely be interested in your input

a reply to: joeraynor

Gets a star for making me chuckle

originally posted by: MarioOnTheFly

what a fantastic fairytale. Very entertaining.

If I wanted to post fairy tales I would have posted in religion or short stories forums, but as its science thats the forum it goes in

Interesting article!

I love all of this new information we are getting about the universe.

s&f

a reply to: expatwhite

OK, why is it a fairytale? Please can you expand a little and say why this is wrong?

Since you ask. There's about at least a hundred "scientific" guesses in that story. Statistical probability that all elements of this fantastic story are correct, are close to zero.

a reply to: MarioOnTheFly

I'm gonna need a more in-depth reply. Can you provide the statistical probability research that lead you to that statement?

And please list the 'guesses' (didn't know assumption wasn't permitted in scientific research) and what you would state is the probable.

Thanks.

originally posted by: MarioOnTheFly
a reply to: expatwhite

OK, why is it a fairytale? Please can you expand a little and say why this is wrong?

Since you ask. There's about at least a hundred "scientific" guesses in that story. Statistical probability that all elements of this fantastic story are correct, are close to zero.

Sure, but which of those guesses are backed up by the most evidence?

Obviously the standard model of the creation of what we call our universe has some holes to fill and needs some tweaking, similar to the hole-filling and tweaking that most theories have undergone during their development, but which alternate theory for the creation of what we call our universe fits the observational data and experimental data the best?

a reply to: soulpowertothendegree

human thirst to find out where we come from
when i say we i mean the world around us
and when we come from of course

it really bothers me that i dont know these things

a reply to: zazzafrazz

I'm gonna need a more in-depth reply. Can you provide the statistical probability research that lead you to that statement?

yes...the more number of guesses...the likelihood of getting them all right diminishes....slowly towards zero.

And please list the 'guesses' (didn't know assumption wasn't permitted in scientific research) and what you would state is the probable.

you just cant take an assumption and call it truth. Let alone science...I'm hardcore on the empirical evidence. Big bang is nothing but numbers based on constants which are dubious in it's constanticity. It can not be proven outside the scientific theory...which has somehow become fact, I was told recently.

Listing guesses is out of scope of my memory and knowledge on various specifics. It's sufficient to say we all know they are there.

what you would state is the probable

what is most probable...is that we just don't know. It is beyond our limited interface to grasp. Most probably.

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

but which alternate theory for the creation of what we call our universe fits the observational data and experimental data the best?

Maybe we just dont have it yet...maybe we never will. One the fits in all details...has all the explanations. When everything fits. But we cant begin to understand until we know all the components. It is rather presumptuous of us think that we know the elements and forces during creation and it's nature in general.

But I don't mind guessing. Just dont call it truth.

a reply to: joeraynor

Darn.
You beat me to it.
Lol.

originally posted by: expatwhite
Good find and a really interesting read. Maybe when we have better equipment we will find things even older that will cause us to revise our estimate of the universes age.

Nice to see a thread on here that won't lead to childish bickering.

I can fix that if you like.

originally posted by: expatwhite
a reply to: MarioOnTheFly

OK, why is it a fairytale? Please can you expand a little and say why this is wrong? I am far from an expert so an alternative theory would be welcome and honestly considered.

As long as it's not "God" did it in 6 days I would genuinely be interested in your input

You laugh at 6 days but according to science, all the fine tuned forces and constants were set in less than a minute, everything that happened after that into the big bang was set and predetermined. The expansion, galaxies, planets, life.
Bowing down to your own alter doesn't make it any less laughable.