The Milky Way is the galaxy we are part of, and scientists are constantly analyzing it to discover as many of its secrets as possible, but an extremely important one comes from outside it. More precisely, scientists discovered the fact that in a galaxy very far away from the Milky Way there would be water, something that seemed impossible to observe at such a great distance from Earth, but here it happened this, finally.
Until this discovery, the Milky Way was believed to be the only galaxy in the universe where there is water, but now scientists have used the Atacama telescope to prove the opposite. That galaxy is 12.88 billion light-years away from Earth, so the discovery is all the more impressive as it comes from the Milky Way, and not from a much closer area, so the scientists deserve praise for the achievement.
The Milky Way: EXTRAORDINARY Premiere, It Was Thought Impossible
Until now, the Milky Way has had water discovered in the solar system on various objects, but in frozen form for now, so its observation in the galaxy is an important first. That galaxy is much older than the Milky Way, being considered one of the first formed after the appearance of the universe, and the existence of water there would be a conformation of the fact that molecules have existed since the beginning of the universe, at least in certain areas of it.
"Using high-resolution ALMA observations of the molecular gas in the pair of galaxies known collectively as SPT0311-58, we detected both water and carbon monoxide molecules in the larger of the two galaxies. Oxygen and carbon, in particular, are first-generation elements, and in the molecular forms of carbon monoxide and water, they are essential to life as we know it.
This galaxy is the most massive currently known galaxy at high redshift, or when the Universe was still very young. It has more gas and dust compared to other galaxies in the early Universe, which gives us lots of potential opportunities to observe abundant molecules and better understand how these life-creating elements influenced the development of the early Universe."
The Milky Way has not only water inside it, but also various gases, including carbon dioxide, and this was also detected by scientists inside the so distant one. All in all, scientists have managed to discover a series of elements so far from the Milky Way that they are looking for in many areas of the galaxy, but finding them at such a distance from it is an extremely big surprise for many of them.
The Milky Way still remains in the attention of scientists from all over the world, and this is because despite the discovery in the distant galaxy, there are many mysteries that still need to be unraveled here as well.
