In studying the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image… this one:

Hubble Ultra Deep Field - the small, cramped version. NASA/ESA Hubble ST

Scientists discovered a distant galaxy in the constellation Fornax, believed to have been present about 600 million years after the Big Bang.  We’re seeing light from this galaxy after it’s traveled about 13 billion light years.  This places the galaxy (its “common name” is HUDF.YD3) at about 30 billion light years away from us.  Here it is:

NASA/ESA Hubble ST - UDFy-38135539

With a redshift of about 8.6″, HUDF.YD3 is the most distant object in the observable universe found so far.  You know your “universe history”, right?  Well, HUDF.YD3 proves that by 600 million years post Bang, stars in these first galaxies had almost completed the process of hydrogen reionization, ending the Dark Ages.

HUDF.YD3 is believed to have been about 1/10th the diameter of the Milky Way, and contained about a billion stars.  It’s total mass would have been about 1% of the Milky Way.  The most distant object previously known was GRB 090423; which has a redshift of 8.2″.  GRB 090423 is about 30 million years younger than HUDF.YD3… or rather, the light we’re currently receiving was emitted about 630 million years post Bang.

Gemini/NASA - GRB 090423

HUDF.YD3 sits in a clear “bubble” in the early hydrogen fog.  Scientists are hoping to find even more distant objects, as the first galaxies are believed to have formed about 200 million years post Bang.  There are probably other galaxies near HUDF.YD3, but they haven’t been identified as of yet. HUDF.YD3 appears as a very faint “smudge” in the Ultra Deep Field image.  Announced October 2010, this discovery is nothing short of spectacular.

Scientists will be studying the Ultra Deep Field image for decades to come.  Who knows?  Maybe YOU will be the one to discover a more distant object.