Cold neutral gas in early universe prompts rethink of galaxy cluster evolution
Phys.org••science
Key Points:
- Researchers at the Cosmic Dawn Center, Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, have observed an unexpectedly high density of cold, neutral hydrogen gas in an early-stage massive galaxy cluster, challenging previous understandings of galaxy cluster evolution.
- The discovery contradicts existing models that predicted the gas would have been ionized about one billion years after the Big Bang, suggesting that large-scale ionization occurred differently than assumed.
- The presence of abundant cold, neutral gas implies that galaxy clusters may have evolved through different processes, with gas "feeding" star and galaxy formation more extensively than previously thought.
- Master's student Chamilla Terp developed a new observational method using the James Webb Space Telescope to distinguish gas within galaxy clusters from foreground gas, enabling
