• Webb Space Telescope detects universe's

    From ScienceDaily@1:317/3 to All on Mon Jun 5 22:30:42 2023
    Webb Space Telescope detects universe's most distant complex organic
    molecules

    Date:
    June 5, 2023
    Source:
    University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, News Bureau
    Summary:
    Researchers have detected complex organic molecules in a galaxy more
    than 12 billion light-years away from Earth -- the most distant
    galaxy in which these molecules are now known to exist. Thanks
    to the capabilities of the recently launched James Webb Space
    Telescope and careful analyses from the research team, a new study
    lends critical insight into the complex chemical interactions that
    occur in the first galaxies in the early universe.


    Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIN Email

    ==========================================================================
    FULL STORY ========================================================================== Researchers have detected complex organic molecules in a galaxy more
    than 12 billion light-years away from Earth -- the most distant galaxy in
    which these molecules are now known to exist. Thanks to the capabilities
    of the recently launched James Webb Space Telescope and careful analyses
    from the research team, a new study lends critical insight into the
    complex chemical interactions that occur in the first galaxies in the
    early universe.

    University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign astronomy and physics professor
    Joaquin Vieira and graduate student Kedar Phadke collaborated with
    researchers at Texas A&M University and an international team of
    scientists to differentiate between infrared signals generated by some
    of the more massive and larger dust grains in the galaxy and those of
    the newly observed hydrocarbon molecules.

    The study findings are published in the journal Nature.

    "This project started when I was in graduate school studying
    hard-to-detect, very distant galaxies obscured by dust," Vieira
    said. "Dust grains absorb and re-emit about half of the stellar radiation produced in the universe, making infrared light from distant objects
    extremely faint or undetectable through ground-based telescopes."
    In the new study, the JWST received a boost from what the researchers
    call "nature's magnifying glass" -- a phenomenon called gravitational
    lensing. "This magnification happens when two galaxies are almost
    perfectly aligned from the Earth's point of view, and light from the
    background galaxy is warped and magnified by the foreground galaxy into
    a ring-like shape, known as an Einstein ring," Vieira said.

    The team focused the JWST on SPT0418-47 -- an object discovered using
    the National Science Foundation's South Pole Telescope and previously identified as a dust-obscured galaxy magnified by a factor of about 30
    to 35 by gravitational lensing. SPT0418-47 is 12 billion light-years
    from Earth, corresponding to a time when the universe was less than 1.5
    billion years old, or about 10% of its current age, the researchers said.

    "Before having access to the combined power of gravitational lensing
    and the JWST, we could neither see nor spatially resolve the actual
    background galaxy through all of the dust," Vieira said.

    Spectroscopic data from the JWST suggest that the obscured interstellar
    gas in SPT0418-47 is enriched in heavy elements, indicating that
    generations of stars have already lived and died. The specific compound
    the researchers detected is a type of molecule called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon, or PAH. On Earth, these molecules can be found in the exhaust produced by combustion engines or forest fires. Being comprised of carbon chains, these organic molecules are considered the basic building blocks
    for the earliest forms of life, the researchers said.

    "What this research is telling us right now -- and we are still learning
    -- is that we can see all of the regions where these smaller dust grains
    are located -- regions that we could never see before the JWST," Phadke
    said. "The new spectroscopic data lets us observe the galaxy's atomic
    and molecular composition, providing very important insights into the
    formation of galaxies, their lifecycle and how they evolve." "We didn't
    expect this," Vieira said. "Detecting these complex organic molecules at
    such a vast distance is game-changing regarding future observations. This
    work is just the first step, and we're just now learning how to use it and learn its capabilities. We are very excited to see how this plays out."
    "It's extremely cool that galaxies I discovered while writing my thesis
    would one day be observed by the JWST," Vieira said. "I am grateful to
    the U.S.

    taxpayers, the NSF and NASA for funding and supporting both the SPT and
    the JWST. Without these instruments, this discovery could have never
    been made." Vieira also is the director of the Center for AstroPhysical Surveys, funded by the National Center for Supercomputing Applications
    at Illinois. Phadke is a CAPS graduate fellow.

    The Space Telescope Science Institute operates the JWST under the
    management of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy,
    Inc., under NASA contract NAS 5-03127.

    * RELATED_TOPICS
    o Space_&_Time
    # Galaxies # Astrophysics # Astronomy # Space_Telescopes #
    Cosmology # NASA # Space_Exploration # Extrasolar_Planets
    * RELATED_TERMS
    o Spitzer_space_telescope o Galaxy o Milky_Way o
    Andromeda_Galaxy o Galaxy_formation_and_evolution o
    Planetary_nebula o Hubble_Deep_Field o Globular_cluster

    ========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Illinois_at_Urbana-Champaign,_News_Bureau.

    Original written by Lois Yoksoulian. Note: Content may be edited for
    style and length.


    ========================================================================== Journal Reference:
    1. Justin S. Spilker, Kedar A. Phadke, Manuel Aravena, Melanie
    Archipley,
    Matthew B. Bayliss, Jack E. Birkin, Matthieu Be'thermin, James
    Burgoyne, Jared Cathey, Scott C. Chapman, Haakon Dahle, Anthony
    H. Gonzalez, Gayathri Gururajan, Christopher C. Hayward, Yashar
    D. Hezaveh, Ryley Hill, Taylor A. Hutchison, Keunho J. Kim, Seonwoo
    Kim, David Law, Ronan Legin, Matthew A. Malkan, Daniel P. Marrone,
    Eric J. Murphy, Desika Narayanan, Alex Navarre, Grace M. Olivier,
    Jeffrey A. Rich, Jane R.

    Rigby, Cassie Reuter, James E. Rhoads, Keren Sharon, J. D. T. Smith,
    Manuel Solimano, Nikolaus Sulzenauer, Joaquin D. Vieira, David
    Vizgan, Axel Weiss, Katherine E. Whitaker. Spatial variations in
    aromatic hydrocarbon emission in a dust-rich galaxy. Nature, 2023;
    DOI: 10.1038/ s41586-023-05998-6 ==========================================================================

    Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/06/230605181233.htm

    --- up 1 year, 14 weeks, 10 hours, 51 minutes
    * Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)