Using the Very Large Telescope and the radio telescope ALMA in Chile, a team of scientists discovered a swarm of galaxies in the early universe. The observation gives important clues to how bright the universe is and how it evolved into quasars.
How galaxies form, grow, and evolve is a major issue in astronomy.
Most galaxies have a black hole in their center. A phenomenon known as a quasar is caused when these monsters swallow gas and stars.
From the beginning of the universe to the end.
There are many unanswered questions about the transition from normal to quasars. In a new study published in Nature Communications, a team of astronomy experts may have found a way to understand this evolution.
"Before evolving into a full-blown quasar, some galaxies are thought to go through a phase of being very dusty, and very active in terms of star formation and accretion of gas onto their central, super massive black holes." An experiment was designed to learn more about the transition phase.
One of the most massive and gas-rich galaxies in the distant universe was the focus of a group of people.
The dust is heated by the stars and the black hole to make it glow. This has led to the creation of hot dust-obscured galaxies.
There are Galaxies in 3D.
Ginolfi and his team decided to use the "MUSE" instrument at the Very Large Telescope in Chile to observe the evolution of the universe. They were able to see a region 40 times larger than the galaxy.
The Cosmic Dawn Center's Peter Laursen was involved in the study. He says that the observations show that W0410-0913 is surrounded by a large group of smaller galaxies. The MUSE instrument allows us to measure both their position on the sky and their distance along our line of sight. We can measure their positions.
Since hot dogs are thought to live in dense environments, it's not surprising that W0410-0913 is in a region ten times denser than the average universe.
There is a car wreck.
At a time when the universe was just a few years old, it is already ten times the size of our own. It takes a lot of fresh material to grow a big galaxy and feed a black hole. This is in line with the conventional view that massive galaxies grow by being attracted from space by their immense gravity.
The rate of merging and interacting is expected to be very high in a dense environment. The astronomer thought the clumps of gas and stars would be a car wreck.
The internal motion of the gas was measured by the group of people who dug into old observations obtained by the ALMA radio antennae.
There was a completely different picture emerging.
The pebbles were thrown at a window.
The ALMA observations showed that the interactions with companion galaxies did not seem to bother W0410-0913. Gas is orderly around the central black hole according to the observations. The speeds reach 500 km/s.
The results from the two different telescopes show a picture of how the most massive and dusty galaxies may evolve. A vital stage in the transition from a dusty and star-forming galaxy to a quasar can grow in dense environments. Despite the expected frequent merging with other galaxies, these interactions are not necessarily destructive because they feed the central galaxy and whirl up the gas a bit. You can scratch the glass, but it won't break.
The first clues on the multi-scale process that drive the evolution of the rare and extreme population of hot dust-obscured galaxies can be found in the observations made byMichele Ginolfi. The interaction with their companions can be gentle.
The study came close to not being conducted at all when the study's author was stuck in a traffic jam in Rome and had to use his phone to submit his proposal.
More information: M. Ginolfi et al, Detection of companion galaxies around hot dust-obscured hyper-luminous galaxy W0410-0913, Nature Communications (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-32297-x Journal information: Nature Communications
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