10 oldest galaxies ever discovered by NASA

TOI Science Desk / TIMESOFINDIA.COM / May 5, 2025, 10:00 IST

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NASA has discovered the ten oldest galaxies. These galaxies offer a glimpse into the early universe. GN-z11 is the oldest, formed 400 million years after the Big Bang. UDFy-38135539 marks the start of galaxy construction. EGS-zs8-1 shows rapid galaxy development. Himiko has massive star formation. CR7 contains a supermassive black hole.

10 oldest galaxies ever discovered by NASA

The discovery of the oldest galaxies presents a unique chance to investigate the origins of the universe. These ancient galaxies, which were formed billions of years ago, are windows to the past that help us understand the creation and evolution of the universe. In this article, we discuss the 10 oldest galaxies ever seen, their distinctive features, importance, and what they tell us about the early universe. Each galaxy contributes to unraveling the tale of the birth of the universe, providing useful pieces of information regarding the creation of galaxies, stars, and cosmic formations that form the universe we experience now.

NASA reveals 10 oldest galaxies ever seen

1. GN-z11 (13.4 billion years old)

Age from Earth: 13.4 billion light years

Importance of GN-z11: GN-z11 is currently the oldest galaxy that has ever been discovered. At 13.4 billion light-years away, the light from it that we are seeing today was emitted only 400 million years after the Big Bang. GN-z11 is therefore one of the universe's oldest galaxies ever to have existed, and it gives us an eyewitness report of what the universe had evolved into.
Key features:

Evolution and creation: This galaxy is important as much as the conditions under which galaxies evolved when the universe was young. The creation of this galaxy enables scientists to study how the first galaxies evolved from the residual gas of the Big Bang.

Cosmological implications: This find puts to null the new galaxy formation hypothesis based upon which galaxies also had the potential of forming much earlier than the already determined ages, even going as far back as the first 400 million years of the universe.

2. UDFy-38135539 (13.1 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 13.1 billion light years
Significance of UDFy-38135539: It's considered 400 million years after the Big Bang. This was a milestone since it holds details of how the universe started to evolve from cosmic "dark ages" to times of galaxy construction. UDFy-38135539 was a milestone in the evolutionary history of the universe when stars and galaxies first began to form.
Key features

Early Universe image: UDFy-38135539 is an early universe image on which scientists are able to witness the formation of the first stars and galaxies.

Star formation: Seeing this galaxy enables researchers to see the star formation rate of the stars at this type of early point in the life of the universe.

3. EGS-zs8-1 (13 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 13 billion light years
Importance of EGS-zs8-1: EGS-zs8-1 is one of the farthest galaxies viewed. Its light took 13 billion years to arrive on our planet, letting us see a galaxy that already existed only 700 million years after the Big Bang. Its discovery offers some unique insights about how galaxies burst forth in existence quickly in an infant universe.

Faraway observations: Because of the vast distance, EGS-zs8-1 is one of the oldest instances of galaxy evolution. The fast development and evolution of the galaxy are evidence that the universe's first galaxies developed rapidly.

Galaxy structure: Scientists can learn the way galaxies evolve and move early on by observing EGS-zs8-1, such as how stars form and galactic systems develop.

4. Himiko (12.9 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.9 billion light years
Significance of Himiko: Himiko is an interesting galaxy because of its sheer size and its vast star-forming region that it possesses. The galaxy allows us to get an idea about how things used to be when stars formed so that the process could have taken place at pace in the universe so that scientists can gain better knowledge about how the process of star formation evolved some time after the Big Bang.
Main characteristics:

Massive star formation: Himiko has a massive star-forming region, and therefore it is an excellent object to observe the evolution of stars in the early universe.

Cosmic evolution: It is useful information to know how massive galaxies such as Himiko evolved and formed because massive galaxies such as Himiko would have initiated galaxy growth in the early universe.

5. CR7 (12.9 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.9 billion light years
Importance of CR7: CR7 is special in that it has a supermassive black hole, one of the reasons why it is as interesting as galaxies get when it comes to the early universe. Black holes are rich sources of information regarding the structure and formation of galaxies and thus the evolution of the universe itself.
Key features:

Supermassive Black Hole: A supermassive black hole in this young galaxy is an opportunity to witness the formation and evolution of the black holes in the early universe.

Early Black Hole formation: CR7 challenges the traditional understanding of how black holes formed, and researchers have already started wondering if supermassive black holes could have been formed much earlier than previously thought.

6. AzTEC-3 (12.8 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.8 billion light years
Importance of AzTEC-3: AzTEC-3 is important since it was an actively star-forming galaxy in the early universe owing to its high star formation rate. Researchers can observe galaxies such as this one and see how galaxies evolved and came into being and how fast they did so during the universe's first billion years after the Big Bang.
Important features:

Star formation rate: AzTEC-3 possesses a high star formation rate that yields valuable information regarding processes accountable for the high rate of star formation in the early universe.

Galaxy evolution: The galaxy yields valuable information regarding the evolution of the galaxies in the early times, including their growth processes and how they developed from small areas of star formation to massive-scale structures.

7. SXDF-NB1006-2 (12.6 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.6 billion light years
Significance of SXDF-NB1006-2: SXDF-NB1006-2 is significant as it has a Lyman-alpha emitter, which is something that has primitive information about the early hydrogen makeup of the universe. It has information about the state of the universe at times which are just after the cosmic dark ages ended when the first stars started to ionize hydrogen in the universe.
Key features

Lyman-Alpha emitter: Lyman-alpha emission in galaxies is an effective method to disentangle the galaxy and star formation initiation process, end of dark ages, and reionization.

Hydrogen and Ionization: This galaxy allows researchers to monitor hydrogen ionization, a process which had a central role in shaping the evolution of the early universe.

8. A1689-zD1 (12.5 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.5 billion light years
Significance of A1689-zD1: A1689-zD1 is unique due to its redshift, hence it is distant from the Earth. The high-redshift young galaxies such as A1689-zD1 provide excellent information about the universe during the early time and tell us a lot about the creation of young galaxies and the state of the universe during the early times.
Key features:

Redshift observation: The redshift of A1689-zD1 is high, and this provides an insight into how the universe existed 700 million years ago so that scientists can observe how it started.

Cosmic distance: The distance of this galaxy is enormous, making it a good candidate to utilize for the purposes of measuring the universe's expansion and distribution of matter in its past.

9. SPT0615-57 (12.8 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.8 billion light years
Why SPT0615-57 is important: SPT0615-57 is the most distant galaxy ever seen. While roughly 1/10th as large as the Milky Way, observing it allows astronomers to learn more about galaxy formation in the early universe.
Key features:

Tight size, far distance: The tight size compared to its huge distance defies present theories of galaxy formation and indicates that the smaller galaxies were more prevalent in the early universe.

Galaxy evolution insights: Viewing this galaxy will allow scientists to identify how the small galaxies evolved and how they contributed to the formation of the large cosmic structures that exist today.

10. GN-108036 (12.9 billion years old)

Distance from Earth: 12.9 billion light years
Importance of GN-108036: GN-108036 is among the faintest galaxies ever observed, and its discovery was therefore extremely challenging. Though very faint, the galaxy provides very crucial information about the early state of the universe and the nature of galaxies in the distant universe.
Major features:

Finiteness and minuteness: GN-108036 is small 1/20th the size of the Milky Way and very faint, so it will be hard to find. But how faint it actually is tells us a lot about diversity within galaxies in the early universe.

Galactic evolution in the early Universe: This galaxy provides us with a glimpse of the early history of galaxy evolution, refining galaxy models of evolution throughout the ages.

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