{"id":249900,"date":"2026-01-21T13:01:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T13:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/249900\/"},"modified":"2026-01-21T13:01:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T13:01:09","slug":"james-webb-telescope-detects-red-monsters-that-overturn-our-understanding-of-the-first-galaxies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/249900\/","title":{"rendered":"James Webb telescope detects \u201cred monsters\u201d that overturn our understanding of the first galaxies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Galaxies as massive as the Milky Way aren\u2019t unusual \u2014 except when they appear in the early Universe. And according to current models of galaxy formation, that simply shouldn\u2019t be possible.<\/p>\n

At the dawn of time, vast halos of dark matter<\/a> surrounded ordinary matter \u2014 gas \u2014 bound together by gravity. Galaxies formed within these structures by converting, at most, 20 percent of their gas into stars. That\u2019s the standard theory, widely accepted by astronomers. But new observations described in Nature by an international research team could turn that theory on its head.<\/p>\n

The findings come from a James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) program designed to study a full sample of emission-line galaxies \u2014 or ELGs \u2014 from the first billion years of cosmic history. These galaxies are identified by the brightness and intensity of their emission lines, which stand out against their dark spectra and allow scientists to measure their stellar content with precision.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

These extremely massive and dusty galaxies from the first billion years after the Big Bang were discovered by an international team of researchers using the James Webb Space Telescope. They indicate that the early Universe formed stars more efficiently than previously thought. \u00a9 NASA, CSA, ESA, M. Xiao & P. \u200b\u200bA. Oesch (University of Geneva), G. Brammer (Niels Bohr Institute), Dawn JWST Archive<\/p>\n

Galaxies that forge stars at incredible speed<\/p>\n

Most of the galaxies studied fit comfortably within the existing model. But astronomers also discovered three striking outliers \u2014 \u201cred monsters,\u201d nearly as massive as our Milky Way. They appear glowing red in JWST\u2019s images because they\u2019re rich in cosmic dust<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Thanks to the telescope\u2019s extraordinary capabilities, researchers were able to track how these galaxies built up their stellar mass over time. Their analysis revealed that these \u201cmonsters\u201d formed stars almost twice as efficiently as smaller galaxies from the same era or as typical galaxies in later cosmic times.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany processes in galaxy evolution tend to slow the rate at which gas turns into stars,\u201d explained Stijn Wuyts of the University of Bath. \u201cBut somehow, these \u2018red monsters\u2019 seem to have bypassed most of those limits.\u201d<\/p>\n

Are there more \u201cred monsters\u201d out there?<\/p>\n

Three examples alone aren\u2019t enough to topple the standard model of cosmology \u2014 but they certainly raise questions. Current models may need to evolve to account for mechanisms that allow some galaxies to grow so massive, so early in the Universe<\/a>\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

More precise observations of these \u201cred monsters\u201d are already planned using the James Webb telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile. Scientists hope to uncover additional ultramassive, ancient galaxies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese discoveries offer new insights into the conditions that shaped the earliest ages of our Universe,\u201d said Mengyuan Xiao of the University of Geneva, the study\u2019s lead author. \u201cOur \u2018red monsters\u2019 are just the beginning of a new era in exploring the young cosmos.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"mayer-nathalie\"<\/p>\n

Nathalie Mayer<\/p>\n

Journalist<\/p>\n

Born in Lorraine on a freezing winter night, storytelling has always inspired me, first through my grandmother’s tales and later Stephen King’s imagination. A physicist turned science communicator, I’ve collaborated with institutions like CEA, Total, Engie, and Futura. Today, I focus on unraveling Earth’s complex environmental and energy challenges, blending science with storytelling to illuminate solutions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Galaxies as massive as the Milky Way aren\u2019t unusual \u2014 except when they appear in the early Universe.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249901,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[85,46,141,145],"class_list":["post-249900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}