The curtain has finally risen at the dawn of the universe thanks to the new James Webb Telescope (JWST) of the space agencies of the United States (NASA), Europe (ESA) and Canada (CSA): in its first scientific observations it has in fact immortalized two galaxies among the oldest of the early universe, between 350 and 450 million year after the Big Bang. This is confirmed by a study conducted by an international team led by Italy with the National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF). The results are published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Researchers from the Italian Space Agency’s Space Science Data Center (ASI), the University of Ferrara and the University of Milan also participated in the international collaboration.
The two galaxies, among the oldest observed to date, were identified thanks to observations of the very distant galaxy cluster Abell 2744 and two adjacent regions of sky, made by the powerful Space Telescope between June 28 and 29, 2022 within the scope of the Glass-Jwst Early Release program. Science Program.
“There was a lot of curiosity to finally find out what Jwst could tell us about the cosmic dawn, as well as of course the desire and ambition to be the first to show the scientific community the results obtained from our scanning glass,” says Marco Castellano. , INAF Rome researcher and first author of the article. “It was not easy to analyze such new data in a short time: the collaboration worked 7 days a week and practically 24 hours a day thanks to the fact that we had participation covering all time zones.”
“These observations are revolutionary: a new chapter in astronomy has been opened,” comments Paola Santini, INAF researcher in Rome and co-author of the new article. Already after the early days of data collection, Jwst showed that he was able to uncover astrophysical sources in as yet unexplored epochs.”
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