BEIJING, Oct. 20 (Xinhua) — China’s “eye in the sky,” also known as the Five Hundred Meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST), has discovered a huge atomic gas structure in the proximity of a group of galaxies.
The finding came as the world’s most sensitive radio telescope “cast its gaze” on Stephan’s Quintet, a visual group of five galaxies, four of which form a compact group of galaxies.
The linear scale of hydrogen’s atomic structure reaches about two million light-years or 0.6 megaparsecs, the largest of its kind ever discovered in the universe, according to the study published Wednesday in the journal Nature.
In addition, the structure encompasses an extended source about 0.4 megaparsecs in size associated with the debris field, and a curved diffuse feature about 0.5 megaparsecs in length attached to the southern edge of the extended source, according to the study. .
The researchers explained that the diffuse feature was likely produced by tidal interactions in the early stages of Stephan’s Quintet formation.
The results provided new information that improves our understanding of the evolution of gases in the universe. However, it is still unclear how this low-density hydrogen gas can survive ionization by the interstellar ultraviolet background on such a long time scale, according to the study.
Meanwhile, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope recently captured an image of Stephan’s Quintet, showing in detail how interacting galaxies cause each other to form stars and how the gas in the galaxies is being altered.