A team of astronomers at the University of Milano-Bicocca has uncovered a colossal spiral galaxy that existed just 2 billion years after the Big Bang, which gave birth to the universe some 13.8 billion years ago. Nicknamed "Big Wheel," it is in fact one of the largest galaxies ever observed from this early cosmic era.
The scientists found Big Wheel near a quasar, which is a powerful and active supermassive black hole, using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The galaxy lies 11.7 billion light-years away from our corner of the cosmos, and its given nickname comes from its remarkably fast rotation and huge size. It's five times more massive than the Milky Way, for context, stretches across 100,000 light-years.
