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Astronomers Discover When Galaxies Got Their Spirals

KentuckyFC writes "The universe today is filled with beautiful spiral galaxies — but it hasn't always been this way. In the early universe, there were no spiral galaxies, raising an interesting question: when did galaxies get their spirals, and how did they emerge? Now astronomers have the answer, thanks to an analysis of galaxies in an image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope known as the Ultra Deep Field. This shows some 10,000 galaxies of various ages. By ordering a subset of these by type and by age, astronomers have worked out how and when spirals must have evolved. It turns out the first spiral galaxies were simple two-armed structures and appeared when the universe was about 3.8 billion years old. But they say the universe had to wait until it was 8 billion years old before more complex multi-armed galaxies emerged, like the Milky Way and Andromeda."

2 of 56 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Evolution of complex structure. by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well perhaps not a Coincidence.

    We are a creation of a second generation star. With our heavier elements that are assumed to be a product of the first generation stars dying process.
    Assuming most Stars last an average of 10 billion years. It would be save to assume the second generation started 8 billion years after the big bang. Now creating of these heavier elements probably made gravity distribution in the galaxy a little less consistent creating new shapes too.

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  2. Re:Evolution of complex structure. by SJHillman · · Score: 4, Informative

    If I'm remembering my astronomy correctly, first generation stars were much larger and faster rotating, but also much shorter-lived in general - some had lifespans possibly as short as a few million years.