Nebula

by *ahermin

marita

Artist’s Comments

Astronomers believe they have witnessed the birth of a giant galaxy for the first time, detecting evidence that perhaps a billion suns ignited within a huge gas cloud 71 billion trillion miles from Earth.

The object, a proto-galaxy designated as radio wave source 3C 326,1, is too far away for scientists to be positive what it is. But, according to Hyron Spinrad, a professor of astronomy at the University of California at Berkeley, they believe they have found ”the first evidence for a massive galaxy seen during its formation stages long ago and far away.”

”We’re talking about the turn-on of an entire galaxy, or at least that’s what we think,” he said Monday at the American Astronomical Society’s annual meeting.

AP, January 7, 1987