NASA has recently discovered what they think is the most distant object to ever be observed. This object is actually a galaxy named MACS0647-JD and it’s so far away that normally we wouldn’t be able to see it, even with our best telescopes. So, how are we able to see it then? Well, we lucked out, we got a little help from a cluster of galaxies known as MACS J0647+7015. Large celestial objects like galaxies have such large gravitational influence that they can actually distort and bend light passing near them. In the case of MACS J0647+7015, NASA was able to use this gravitational distortion as kind of a deep space magnifying glass. This effect is what enabled NASA to capture the light of this distant galaxy.
The light of MACS0647-JD has taken nearly 13.3 billion years to reach Earth. We are essentially looking at an object from the theorized beginning of the universe (the big bang). This amazing discovery actually gets me thinking about the distances between objects in space and how long it takes for light to travel between them.
What if we could somehow instantaneously appear 65 million light years away from Earth, and what if we had a telescope with us that was capable of zooming in all the way to the Earth’s surface. Would we see dinosaurs walking the Earth? Theoretically, yes, we should. This raises some fun ideas about what’s possible in the universe. What if we just went a fraction of our first trip away from Earth? Perhaps we only go far enough away to witness the early beginnings of human civilization and maybe we could just get it all on video. This video would be our exact history, nothing unchanged or lost from our true story. How amazing would that be?
Assuming that in our hypothetical world we can travel to almost any distance, we could actually watch the beginning of our solar system. We could know truly how the Moon was formed and perhaps even watch our solar system form, maybe even watch the Milky Way form. Of course we would need to somehow move our camera closer to the objects we are observing at a relatively quick rate in order to watch the creation of large objects like the Milky Way form in a reasonable amount of time, basically a galactic time lapse. Just a little food for thought.
To see a full article on the new discovery, head over to the official NASA post.