These six snapshots taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope show how galaxies similar in mass to our Milky Way evolved over time.
The images reveal that Milky Way-like galaxies grow larger in size and in stellar mass over billions of years. The image at far right reveals a compact, youthful galaxy as it looked 11.3 billion years ago, when our universe was only about 2.5 billion years old. The bluish-white glow reveals that the fledgling galaxy is undergoing a wave of star birth, as its rich reservoir of gas compresses under gravity, creating myriad stars. At 10.3 billion years ago (image at center), the firestorm of star birth is reaching its peak. The stellar "baby boom" churned out stars 30 times faster than the Milky Way does today. The galaxy's yellowish color most likely indicates ongoing star formation that is being obscured by dust and gas.
Eventually, the galaxies exhaust their star-making gas. The galaxy at 8.9 billion years ago has developed a spiral shape, and the oldest stars reside in its central region. Nearly 3 billion years later, a similar galaxy has grown even larger. The galaxy is dominated by mostly older stars, which can be seen in its reddish appearance.
These images are part of the most comprehensive multi-observatory galaxy surveys yet. Stretching back in time more than 10 billion years, the census contains nearly 2,000 snapshots of Milky Way-like galaxies.
The images were taken between 2010 and 2012 with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 and Advanced Camera for Surveys as part of the Cosmic Assembly Near-infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey (CANDELS).
Credits
NASA, ESA, C. Papovich (Texas A&M University), H. Ferguson (STScI), S. Faber (University of California, Santa Cruz), and I. Labbé (Leiden University)| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Milky Way-Mass Galaxies |
| Distance | Redshifts: from z = 0.26 to z = 2.8 |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The science findings are based on various Hubble archival observations of galaxy surveys, including COSMOS, CDF–S, UDS, GOODS, and CANDELS. The images were created from Hubble data from proposal , PIs: S. Faber (University of California, Santa Cruz) and H. Ferguson (STScI), et al. The science team includes: C. Papovich (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), I. Labbé (Leiden Obs.), R. Quadri and V. Tilvi (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), E.F. Bell (U. Michigan, Ann Arbor), K. Glazebrook (CAS/Swinburne U.), L. Spitler (Macquarie U., Sydney/ AAO), C.M.S. Straatman (Leiden Obs.), K.-V. Tran (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), P. Behroozi (STScI), M. Cowley (CAS/Swinburne U.), R. Davé (U. Western Cape/South African Astronomical Obs./African Inst. for Mathematical Sciences, Cape Town), A. Dekel (Hebrew U. of Jerusalem), M. Dickinson (NOAO), H.C. Ferguson (STScI), S.L. Finkelstein (U. Texas, Austin), E. Gawiser (Rutgers U.), H. Inami (NOAO), G. Kacprzak (CAS/Swinburne U.), L. Kawinwanichakij (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), D. Kocevski (U. Kentucky), A. Koekemoer (STScI), D. Koo (Lick Obs./U. California, Santa Cruz), P. Kurczynski (Rutgers U.), J.M. Lotz (STScI), Y. Lu (Kavli Institute/Stanford U.), R.A. Lucas (STScI), D. Mcintosh (U. Missouri, Kansas City), N. Mehrtens (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), B. Mobasher (U. California, Riverside), A. Monson (Carnegie Obs.), G. Morrison (IfA/U. Hawaii/CFHT), T. Nanayakkar (CAS/Swinburne U.), S.E. Persson (Carnegie Obs.), B. Salmon (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), R. Simons (JHU), A. Tomczak (Mitchell Inst./Texas A&M U.), P. van Dokkum (Yale U.), B. Weiner (Steward Obs./U. Arizona), and S.P. Willner (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics). |
| Instrument | HST>ACS/WFC and HST>WFC3/IR |
| Exposure Dates | 2010 – 2012 |
| 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. |
