Detailed analyses of mankind's deepest optical view of the universe, the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF), by several expert teams have at last identified what may turn out to be some of the earliest star-forming galaxies. The sensitivity of Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), combined with the penetrating power of the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS), finally revealed these long-sought faint galaxies. The HUDF shows that close to a billion years after the big bang the early universe was filled with dwarf galaxies, but no fully formed galaxies like our Milky Way. After careful analysis, they have been sorted out as between 54 and 108 dim, red smudges sprinkled across the HUDF image. This image shows the full sample of candidates circled in green. Three enlargements at right show several dwarf objects that are at the limits of Hubble's present instrument capabilities. The HUDF is a small region of sky in the direction of the southern constellation Fornax. The faintest objects are less than one four-billionth the brightness of stars that can be seen with the naked eye. Their light has taken nearly 13 billion years to reach Earth, and so these objects represent some of the earliest star-forming galaxies to form in the universe.
Credits
NASA, ESA, R. Windhorst (Arizona State University) and H. Yan (Spitzer Science Center, Caltech)| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | HUDF, Hubble Ultra Deep Field |
| Object Description | Optical Survey |
| R.A. Position | 03h 32m 39.99s |
| Dec. Position | -27° 48' 0.0" |
| Constellation | Fornax |
| Dimensions | The image is 3 arcminutes square. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | This image was created from HST data from the following proposal: : HUDF Team (STScI). The science teams are: — A.J. Bunker (Univ.of Exeter U.K./ Inst. of Astrophysics, Univ. of Cambridge, U.K.), E.R. Stanway (Inst. of Astrophysics, Univ. of Cambridge, U.K.), R.S. Ellis (California Inst. of Tech.), and R.G. McMahon (Inst. of Astrophysics, Univ. of Cambridge, U.K.) — M. Stiavelli, S. M. Fall, and N. Panagia (STScI) — H. Yan (Spitzer Science Center, California Inst. of Tech.) and R.A. Windhorst (Arizona State Univ.) — R.J. Bouwens and G.D. Illingworth (Univ. of California, Santa Cruz), R.I. Thompson (Steward Obs./Univ. of Arizona), J.P. Blakeslee (Johns Hopkins Univ.), M.E. Dickinson (National Optical Astronomy Obs.), T.J. Broadhurst (The Hebrew Univ., Israel), D.J. Eisenstein and X. Fan (Steward Obs./Univ. of Arizona), M. Franx (Leiden Observatory, Netherlands), G. Meurer (Johns Hopkins Univ.), and P. van Dokkum (Yale Univ.) — S. Malhotra, J.E. Rhoads, N. Pirzkal and C. Xu (STScI) |
| Instrument | HST>ACS/WFC |
| Exposure Dates | September 24, 2003 - January 16, 2004, Exposure Time: 11.3 days |
| Filters | F435W (B), F606W (V), F775W (i), F850LP (z) |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | Blue: F435W (B) Green: F606W (V), F775W (i) Red: F850LP (z) |
| Compass Image |  |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
