The Early Universe Was Bananas

For the longest time, many astrophysicists and cosmologists have assumed that newborn galaxies would look like the orbs and spidery discs familiar in the modern universe.

But according to an analysis of new images from the James Webb Space Telescope, baby galaxies were neither eggs nor discs. They were bananas. Or pickles, or cigars, or surfboards — choose your own metaphor. That is the tentative conclusion of a team of astronomers who re-examined images of some 4,000 newborn galaxies observed by Webb at the dawn of time…

If the result holds, astronomers say that it could profoundly alter their understanding of how galaxies emerge and grow. It could also offer insight into the mysterious nature of dark matter, an unknown and invisible form of matter that astronomers say makes up a major part of the universe and outweighs atomic matter 5 to 1. Dark matter engulfs galaxies and provides the gravitational nurseries in which new galaxies arise.