ESA's Herschel Space Observatory: Ancient Galaxy Producing Stars at Record Pace

Artist's impression of a starburst galaxy similar to the distant HFLS 3, which was churning out stars at a record-setting pace less than a billion years after the Big Bang.

CREDIT: ESA–C. Carreau

Astronomers peering into the early history of the universe have spotted perhaps the most productive star-forming galaxy ever found.

Known as HFLS 3, the young galaxy churns out about 3,000 new stars each year — more than 2,000 times as many as the Milky Way averages, and up to 20 times more than the number created by similar galaxies today.

The massive starburst galaxy existed only 880 million years after the Big Bang that created our universe 13.8 billion years ago, making HFLS 3 the most distant known pure starburst galaxy.

"One of the big surprises was how evolved this galaxy is in terms of its properties," stated principal investigator Dominik Riechers of Cornell University.

Dominik Riechers

Starburst galaxies exist today, burning through their stores of dust and gas to produce stars at a fantastic rate. But HFLS 3 is 15 to 20 times larger, and produces 15 to 20 times more stars, than similar current galaxies.

The difference is in the dust. Early in the history of the universe, when less dust had been converted to stars, galaxies such as HFLS 3 had access to more raw materials.

"The same processes are involved, but just 'supersized,'" Riechers said.

One of tens of thousands of early starburst galaxies detected by the European Space Agency's (ESA) Herschel Space Observatory, HFLS 3 attracted attention because it appeared very red among the rest, which indicated the possibility of greater distance.

Riechers and a team of international astronomers used a suite of instruments from around the world to study the distant structure.

"Finding this galaxy was like looking for a needle in a haystack," Riechers said.