NASA's Webb finds strange objects that don’t fit any existing classification
While looking through James Webb Space Telescope’s archive, a team of astronomers found nine odd galaxies. The galaxies possess a combination of features that astronomers have never seen before. As such, the galaxies cannot be placed into existing categories. The astronomers have likened these galaxies to platypuses. Platypuses are animals that also have an odd combination of features.
The nine galaxies the astronomers discovered have one thing in common — a point-like appearance. Quasars have a similar appearance. But these nine objects are too faint to be quasars. Spectral data showed narrow lines, which are not typical of quasars. Narrow-line galaxies do exist, but they do not appear as point sources. These nine odd objects are also too far away to be stars in our galaxy.
Astronomers have one suggestion to explain these odd galaxies. They think that what Webb has observed is an earlier stage of galaxy formation — earlier than astronomers have ever been able to see. If that is the case, then this discovery could lead astronomers to seek answers for much deeper questions like “How does the process of galaxy formation begin?” But astronomers would have to find more such objects to study further.
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