Related papers: A Glimpse of the First Galaxies
Research over the past 25 years has led to the view that the rich tapestry of present-day cosmic structure arose during the first instants of creation, where weak ripples were imposed on the otherwise uniform and rapidly expanding…
The formation of the first stars and quasars marks the transition between the smooth initial state and the clumpy current state of the Universe. In popular CDM cosmologies, the first sources of light started to form at a redshift z=30 and…
In cosmological models favored by current observations, the first astrophysical objects formed in dark matter halos at redshifts starting at z>20, and their properties were determined by primordial H_2 molecular chemistry. These…
A galaxy's orientation is one of its most basic observable properties. Astronomers once assumed that galaxies are randomly oriented in space, however it is now clear that some have preferred orientations with respect to their surroundings.…
The early stage of the Universe is discussed and the time lengths of its first days are given. If we denote the Hubble time in the zero-gravity limit by T (approximately 12.16 billion years), and T(n) denotes the length of the n-th day,…
The first structures in the Universe formed at z>7, at higher redshift than all currently known galaxies. Since GRBs are brighter than other cosmological sources at high redshift and exhibit simple power-law afterglow spectra that is ideal…
The first stars are believed to have formed a few hundred million years after the big bang in so-called dark matter minihalos with masses ~10^6 M_sun. Their radiation lit up the Universe for the first time, and the supernova explosions that…
The formation of the first galaxies at redshifts z~10-15 signaled the transition from the simple initial state of the universe to one of ever increasing complexity. We here review recent progress in understanding their assembly process with…
The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array and the James Webb Space Telescope are transforming our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution in the early Universe. By combining their capabilities, these observatories provide…
Star formation history shows a gradual decline since the last 8-9 Gyr (z=1). The bulk of present-day stellar mass and metal content was formed at redshifts lower than 2-3, which is consistent with a hierarchical scenario of galaxy…
At redshift z = 2, when the Universe was just three billion years old, half of the most massive galaxies were extremely compact and had already exhausted their fuel for star formation(1-4). It is believed that they were formed in intense…
The first galaxies formed at high redshifts, and were likely substantially less massive than typical galaxies in the local universe. We argue that (1) the reionization of a clumpy intergalactic medium by redshift z=6, (2) its enrichment by…
According to the current understanding of cosmic structure formation, the precursors of the most massive structures in the Universe began to form shortly after the Big Bang, in regions corresponding to the largest fluctuations in the cosmic…
The Universe's dark ages end with the formation of the first generation of galaxies. These objects start emitting ultraviolet radiation that carves out ionized regions around them. After a sufficient number of ionizing sources have formed,…
Probing the growth of structure from the epoch of hydrogen recombination to the formation of the first stars and galaxies is one of the most important uncharted areas of observational cosmology. Far-IR spectroscopy covering $\lambda$…
Many galaxies appear to have taken on their familiar appearance relatively recently. In the distant Universe, galaxy morphology started to deviate significantly (and systematically) from that of nearby galaxies at redshifts, z, as low as z…
In the first two years of operation JWST has delivered key new insights into the formation and evolution of galaxies in the early Universe. By combining imaging with spectroscopy, we discovered and characterised the first generation of…
Galaxies represent the visible fabric of the Universe and there has been considerable progress recently in both observational and theoretical studies. The underlying goal is to understand the present-day diversity of galaxy forms, masses…
During the first 500 million years of cosmic history, the first stars and galaxies formed, seeding the Universe with heavy elements and eventually reionizing the intergalactic medium. Observations with JWST have uncovered a surprisingly…
Globular clusters (GCs) are among the oldest and most luminous stellar systems in the Universe, offering unique insights into galaxy formation and evolution. While the physical processes behind their origin have long remained elusive, major…