Scientists at the Instoruto de Astrofisica de Canarias, a research institute in the Canary Islands, have just discovered one of the brightest galaxies we have ever encountered. It is about a thousand times brighter than our galaxy, has a very high star formation rate, and is 10 thousand million light-years distant from us.
The researchers found that this galaxy uses the effect of gravitational lensing, in which massive objects in space, such as galaxies or galaxy clusters, deform the path of light rays and thus amplify the light from smaller objects nearby. This phenomenon has helped researchers track down exoplanets, black holes, and rather unexpected types of galaxies. The discovery, recently published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, was made possible by a cluster of galaxies that sits between us and a recently discovered bright galaxy. Thanks to the gravitational lens created by the cluster of galaxies between us and the source, which acts like a telescope, the discovered galaxy appears to be 11 times larger and brighter than it actually is.and appears as multiple images on an arc centered in the densest part of the cluster, which is known as the "Einstein ring."
The amplification of light and multiple images of the galaxy created by the effect of gravitational lensing have helped scientists see the galaxy and will further help them analyze its composition in more detail. Researchers named this galaxy the Cosmic Eyebrow because of its resemblance to another galaxy called the Cosmic Eyelash. This galaxy got its name also because it was found near a young galaxy called the Cosmic Eye, which looks like its namesake due to the fact that its image is also distorted by gravitational lensing.
The Cosmic Eyebrow, which we see at earlier stages of development due to its enormous distance, will help researchers understand the formation of large distant galaxies and how they evolve into elliptical galaxies that exist today alongside (by cosmic standards, of course) our galaxy.
This type of object contains the most powerful star-forming zones known in the universe. The next step for scientists will be to study their molecular composition.