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Space

Giant Milky Way-like galaxy formed unusually soon after the big bang

The Big Wheel, discovered using the James Webb Space Telescope, formed just 2 billion years after the big bang - surprisingly early for a spiral galaxy of a similar size to our Milky Way

By James Woodford

17 March 2025

The Big Wheel galaxy formed 2 billion years after the big bang

Weichen Wang

A newly-discovered spiral galaxy, dubbed the Big Wheel, formed just 2 billion years after the big bang – far earlier, considering its size, than astronomers thought possible.

Themiya Nanayakkara, at Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia, says the discovery was an accident. He and his colleagues were looking for quasars, energetic regions at the heart of some galaxies, with the James Webb Space Telescope in November 2022 when a “large spiral galaxy popped up”.

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