Galaxies

An image of the Milky Way superimposed on that of galaxies (represented as yellow dots) simulated in the IllustrisTNG project immersed in dark matter (in green and blue)

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An article published in the journal “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society” reports the results of a study that indicates that the Milky Way is abnormally massive in relation to the so-called Local Sheet, the group of galaxies that surround it. A team of researchers used simulations conducted within the IllustrisTNG project and discovered that a galaxy in the same situation as the Milky Way should be much smaller than the cosmic wall that surrounds it. The simulations indicate that there’s one exception for every million galaxies in IllustrisTNG under the same conditions. This must be kept in mind in studies of galactic environments.

The map of the polarized microwave emission measured by the QUIJOTE experiment

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Six articles published in the journal “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society” report various aspects of the most accurate mapping of the polarization of the Milky Way’s microwave emissions. This provides a map of the galactic magnetic field thanks to the QUIJOTE (Q-U-I JOint TEnerife) experiment. The QUIJOTE Collaboration presented what is only the initial set of scientific papers in a survey that complements the ones obtained from other missions such as the one from the Planck Surveyor satellite. These results are useful to obtain new information on the structure of the Milky Way’s magnetic field and to understand the energetic processes that occurred soon after the birth of the universe.

A mosaic of 690 frames obtained with Webb's Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam) instrument which constitutes one of the first images of the CEERS survey and shows in the insets some examples of primordial galaxies

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An article accepted for publication in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports the results of a study of the structure and morphology of galaxies that existed in the first three billion years of life of the universe. A team of researchers used observations conducted with the James Webb Space Telescope as part of the CEERS survey to obtain enough detail to understand what primordial galaxies were like. The conclusion is a confirmation of previous research regarding the remarkable variety of shapes and structures and turned out even superior thanks to Webb. In many of them, the structures are already quite evolved, as in closer and younger galaxies.

The six barred spiral galaxies identified by the James Webb Space Telescope

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An article accepted for publication in “The Astrophysical Journal Letters” reports the discovery of six barred spiral galaxies that are between 8.4 and 11 billion years old. A team of researchers used the James Webb Space Telescope within the CEERS survey to observe enough details of these galaxies to identify the two extensions of stars that start from their center and reach the outer disk in a structure that resembles a bar. It’s a crucial structure for the evolution of these galaxies, as it favors the growth of the supermassive black holes at their center and star formation in their central regions.

The galaxy clusters MOO J1014+0038 (left panel) and SPT-CL J2106-5844 (right panel) as seen by the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 instrument at infrareds

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An article published in the journal “Nature” reports the results of a study on the so-called intracluster light that permeates galaxy clusters. Hyungjin Joo and M. James Jee of Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea, used the Hubble Space Telescope to examine ten galaxy clusters and the glow within them. The surprising and therefore interesting discovery was that intracluster light is abundant even in the oldest clusters, a sign that the stars that emit it were ejected from their galaxies a long time ago. This suggests that this happened at the same time as the formation and growth of the clusters.