It seems like we might have misjudged how many neighboring
galaxies we have. New calculations show that the cosmos might be a vacant place
than we imagined. So what about Hubble? What about images taken by Hubble
Telescope? Well, since the Hubble launched, we’ve been seeing spectacular image
of the crowded universe. Most of the images come accompanied by guarantees that
what we see in the pictures is just the start. Astronomers have been
impatiently estimating at the amount of pale, distant galaxies that they can’t
see. Lurkers certainly outnumbered observable galaxies. Recent simulations by
Blue Waters, a supercomputer at the National Center for Supercomputing
Applications show that that isn’t the situation. Scientists at Michigan State
University simulated the creation of the initial universe.
The number of bright, glowing galaxies that the simulations projected just about synced up with the data we can see from the Hubble. But the simulations showed that number of pale galaxies, which the Hubble can’t see, wasn’t anyplace near what earlier guesses had estimated. Conservative estimations lessen the number of faint galaxies ten times, but it’s just conceivable that the universe has only one hundredth the faint lurker galaxies we earlier thought it did. We’ll get an impression of whether those guesses are precise when the James Webb telescope goes up in 2018. Rest assured, there are pretty much plenty of galaxies to discover.
[Source: The Astrophysical Journal Letters]
