PDS logoPlanetary Data System
PDS Information
Find a Node - Use these links to navigate to any of the 8 publicly accessible PDS Nodes.

This bar indicates that you are within the PDS enterprise which includes 6 science discipline nodes and 2 support nodes which are overseen by the Project Management Office at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC). Each node is led by an expert in the subject discipline, supported by an advisory group of other practitioners of that discipline, and subject to selection and approval under a regular NASA Research Announcement.
Click here to return to the Photojournal Home Page Click here to view a list of Photojournal Image Galleries Photojournal_inner_header
Latest Images  |  Spacecraft & Technology  |  Animations  |  Space Images App  |  Feedback  |  Photojournal Search  

PIA13782: Galactic City at the Edge of the Universe
Astronomers have discovered a massive cluster of young galaxies forming in the distant universe. The growing galactic metropolis is known as COSMOS-AzTEC3. This image was taken Japan's Subaru telescope atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii.
 Mission:  Subaru Telescope 
 Product Size:  1100 x 1100 pixels (w x h) 
 Produced By:  Subaru 
 Other  
Information: 		 JPL News Release 2011-013 
 Full-Res TIFF:  PIA13782.tif (3.635 MB)
 Full-Res JPEG:  PIA13782.jpg (177.3 kB)  

Click on the image above to download a moderately sized image in JPEG format (possibly reduced in size from original)

Original Caption Released with Image:

click here for larger version for PIA13782click here for larger version for PIA13782
Figure 1Poster Version
Click on an individual image for full resolution tiff image

Astronomers have discovered a massive cluster of young galaxies forming in the distant universe. The growing galactic metropolis, named COSMOS-AzTEC3, is the most distant known massive "proto-cluster" of galaxies, lying about 12.6 billion light-years away from Earth. Members of the developing cluster are shown here, circled in white, in this image taken by Japan's Subaru telescope atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii. The cluster was discovered by a suite of multi-wavelength telescopes, including NASA's Spitzer, Chandra and Hubble space observatories, Subaru and the W.M. Keck Observatory, also atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii.

The other dots in this picture are stars or galaxies that are not members of the cluster -- most of the them are located closer to us than the cluster, but some are farther away. The two brightest spots are stars. Though they appear bright in this image, they are actually tens of thousands of times fainter than what we can see with our eyes.

Image Credit:
Subaru/NASA/JPL-Caltech

Image Addition Date:
2011-01-12