Hundreds of Tiny Milky Ways

Using its near-infrared vision to peer 9 billion years back in time, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has uncovered an extraordinary population of tiny, young galaxies that are brimming with star formation. Most of these galaxies are a hundred times less massive than the Milky Way, yet they churned out stars at a furious pace. However, it’s a mystery why these newly found dwarf galaxies were making batches of stars at such a high rate.

Astronomer Arjen van der Wel says, "The galaxies have been there all along, but up until recently astronomers have been able only to survey tiny patches of sky at the sensitivities necessary to detect them. We weren’t looking specifically for these galaxies, but they stood out because of their unusual colors." The universe is 13.7 billion years old. Hubble spotted the galaxies because the radiation from young, hot stars has caused the oxygen in the gas surrounding them to light up like a bright neon sign. We used to think that star formation was a slow process.

Astronomer Harry Ferguson says, "The finding that there were galaxies of roughly the same size forming stars at very rapid rates at early times is forcing us to re-examine what we thought we knew about dwarf galaxy evolution."

And if stars were being formed so rapidly, maybe Earth-like planets were too. What WE want to know is, have any Visitors from these galaxies and stars come OUR way? We know that SOMEONE is here because Anne Strieber has interviewed a large group of "contactees" (in a totally unique repository of information) about their experiences told IN THEIR OWN WORDS. If you subscribe today, you can listen to all of these fascinating conversations!