The brightest-ever galaxy has reportedly
been discovered by scientists with the help of the Wide-field Infrared
Survey Explorer, a NASA infrared-wavelength astronomical space
telescope.
NASA
scientists said that they had detected the most luminous galaxy ever
encountered in the Universe, after they studied data obtained with the
help of the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), according to a
report published by the Astrophysical Journal.
Why had nobody spotted it before? Not only is the galaxy extremely
distant, but WISE is designed to detect astronomical objects that are
in the infrared wavelength.
Researchers argue that the galaxy, which was named WISE J224607.57-052635, shines in the infrared wavelength with the equivalent light of 300 trillion suns.
The galaxy is part of a newly-defined class of what is known as extremely luminous infrared galaxies, detected by scientists with the help of the WISE telescope.
They explained that the black hole swallows the surrounding gas, emitting visible ultraviolet, and X-ray light. After that, dust clouds start absorbing that light, heat up and then emit infrared light. Scientists also said that the galaxy is about 12.5 billion light-years away, something that they added will help us better understand the Universe's early history; the light which was detected from the newly-discovered galaxy left it long before our sun formed, approximately 4.567 billion years ago.
Researchers argue that the galaxy, which was named WISE J224607.57-052635, shines in the infrared wavelength with the equivalent light of 300 trillion suns.
The galaxy is part of a newly-defined class of what is known as extremely luminous infrared galaxies, detected by scientists with the help of the WISE telescope.
"We found in a related study with WISE that
as many as half of the most luminous galaxies only show up well
in infrared light," according to Chao-Wei Tsai, a scientist at NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who is also lead author of the study on the
extra-bright galaxy.
Scientists did not rule out that a supermassive black hole at the
center of the galaxy may be responsible for its eyebrow-raising
luminosity.They explained that the black hole swallows the surrounding gas, emitting visible ultraviolet, and X-ray light. After that, dust clouds start absorbing that light, heat up and then emit infrared light. Scientists also said that the galaxy is about 12.5 billion light-years away, something that they added will help us better understand the Universe's early history; the light which was detected from the newly-discovered galaxy left it long before our sun formed, approximately 4.567 billion years ago.
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