Astronomers ‘Unscramble’ Einstein Ring To Reveal Most Detailed View Ever Of Star Formation In The Distant Universe
Credit: ALMA (NRAO/ESO/NAOJ)/Y. Tamura (The University of Tokyo)/Mark Swinbank (Durham University)
ALMA’s Long Baseline Campaign produced spectacular images of the distant, gravitationally lensed galaxy called HATLAS J090311.6+003906, otherwise known as SDP.81. New analyses of these images reveal details never before seen in a galaxy so remote, including phenomenally massive yet concentrated clumps of star-forming material.
The ALMA observations of SDP.81, made at the end of 2014, were enabled by a cosmic effect known as gravitational lensing. A large galaxy nestled between SDP.81 and ALMA is acting as a lens, magnifying the more distant galaxy’s light and warping it into a near-perfect example of a phenomenon known as an Einstein Ring.
In the months following these observations, at least seven groups of scientists have independently analyzed the ALMA data on SDP.81. This flurry of research papers has divulged unprecedented information about the galaxy, including details about its structure, contents, motion, and other physical characteristics.
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