The Indian satellite AstroSat has found extreme UV light from a galaxy called AUDFs01, which is 9.3 billion light years away from the Earth.
Madhavan Nair, former chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said the discovery would “throw some on various questions regarding the universe”.
"The mysteries around the origin of the universe and its current status are big questions before humankind. It's just a small beginning and you may not find an impact immediately. But it will strengthen our science enthusiasts to make more and more exploration," Nair, told Sputnik on Tuesday.
Nair added that although AstroStat cost little to build it would help Indian scientists obtain data that is not freely available.
A multi-national team of astronomers made the discovery, led by Indian researcher Dr. Kanak Saha, who is associate professor of astronomy at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), in Pune. The team comprised astronomers from the USA, Japan, India, Switzerland, France, and the Netherlands.
Dr. Somak Raychaudhury, Director of IUCAA said it was important to know what happened in the early universe. "We need to know when this started, but it has been very hard to find the earliest sources of light", he said.
The galaxy under observation by Dr. Saha is located in the Hubble Extreme Deep field. It took almost two years to analyse the data and confirm the emissions from the galaxy, according to Nature Astronomy, which published the research.
Dr. Saha pointed out that the UltraViolet Imaging Telescope's (UVIT) background noise reduction feature is better than the Hubble telescope that helped it discover the emissions.
Though the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has a bigger space telescope, it apparently couldn't detect the emissions because of their very faint nature while the smaller AstroSat/UVIT is capable of capturing UV bands with a wild field of view.
