Astronomers have discovered a faint blue dwarf galaxy situated about 30 million light years away from Earth and located in the constellation called "Leo Minor." They are of the view that this galaxy can be utilized as a medium to test the Big Bang Theory.
The AGC 198691 galaxy, nicknamed Leoncino, denoting the "little lion," contains the lowest level of heavy metals or chemical elements that have been found in any of the galaxies discovered so far. As a result, astronomers at the Indiana University believe that Leoncino can be utilized in the form of a time capsule that will offer scientists further insight into the conditions that prevailed immediately after the creation of the universe, a report published by the university claimed.
According to Professor John J. Salzer from the Bloomington College of Arts and Sciences of the Indiana University, finding the most metal-poor galaxy ever is exciting as it can help contribute to a quantitative test of the Big Bang.
Substantiating his view Professor Salzer said that this is primarily owing to the fact that the existing accepted model regarding the beginning of the universe clearly predicts the amount of helium and hydrogen present during the Big Bang. According to him, the ratio of these atoms in galaxies with very poor levels of heavy metals offers a direct test of the model.
It is worth noting here that in astronomy, any element except hydrogen or helium is referred to as a metal. It has been found that the elemental composition of galaxies poor in metal content is very similar to what existed during the early days of the universe, Space Daily reported.
However, astronomers need to look far beyond Earth to find such low-metal galaxies. In fact, our own Milky Way galaxy is a very poor data resource owing to the elevated levels of heavier elements created in due course due to "stellar processing," as stars mass-produce heavier elements through nucleosynthesis and subsequently distribute these atoms back into the galaxy when they blow up as supernovae.
On the other hand, low metal abundance is basically a sign that insignificant stellar activity has taken place than the majority of the galaxies.
Leoncino is believed to be a member of the "local universe," an expanse of space within a propos 1 billion light years away from Earth and projected to contain numerous million galaxies. Among these, scientists have only catalogued a small portion so far.
According to Salzer, they are eager to continue exploring this mysterious galaxy. Low-metal abundance galaxies are very rare and so they want to learn everything possible, he added. Meanwhile, Salzer is pursuing observing time on other telescopes, including the Hubble Space Telescope, to investigate deeper into this fascinating object.
