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LiveScience
LiveScience
Elizabeth Howell

Oddball 'platypus galaxies' spotted by James Webb telescope may challenge our understanding of galaxy formation

Four newly found galaxies as seen from a telescope.

A new category of space objects dubbed "platypus galaxies" is defying explanation.

These nine strange cosmic objects, spotted in archival data from the James Webb Space Telescope, cannot easily be characterized by their features. They are small and compact, but they don't appear to host active supermassive black holes or to be quasars, enormous black holes that glow as brightly as galaxies, according to new research.

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