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Astronomers in Chile have detected the largest and densest group of galaxies recorded to date.
Looking billions of light-years away in space, they detected the largest collection of galaxies ever recorded, a "proto-superamas", which they nicknamed Hyperion after a titan of Greek mythology.
"Hyperion" was formed while the universe was still young, barely two billion years after the Big Bang, which launched the universe there are about 13.8 billion d & # 39; years
It has a mass of a million billion times greater than the sun and is so far apart that it is seen from Earth billions of years ago.
"Hyperion, it's like 5,000 galaxies of the Milky Way," said astronomer Steffen Miefke, chief of operations of the European Southern Observatory.
The ESO operates the very large telescope in the Atacama desert in Chile, which has detected Hyperion.
"Hyperion is a sixth of the age of the universe, it is as if we could observe the teenage years of an 80 – year – old human being," said Miefke.
"These are galaxies very far from us, almost at the beginning of the universe, and allow us to better understand how the universe has evolved from the Big Bang to the present day."
The team of astronomers who made the discovery was led by Olga Cucciati, of the National Institute of Astrophysics of Bologna.
The galaxy of the Milky Way, which hosts our solar system, dates from about 13.6 billion years ago.
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