GRB 090429B The Most Distant Object in the Universe

The photo to the right is of a gamma-ray burst with the unassuming name of GRB 090429B. This faint red object has the title of the most distant object in the observable universe and therefor the oldest. GRB 090429B's light has been traveling 13.2 billion years or 96% of the age of the Universe itself.  First observed by the Burst Alert Telescope aboard NASA's  Swift satellite when it observed a  five-second-long burst of gamma rays from the constellation Canes Venatici.

What fascinates me about these vast times and distances is that they have very little in common with where and when the object really is now. 13 Billion years ago GRB 090429B was 17 billion light years closer to us and as the light reaches us from 13.2
billion years, the object is in truth more like about thirty billion light-years away!
How is that for a mind bending thought exercise!

Read More at the Daily Galaxy Blog's page

Huge Gama-ray emitters Found Extending from MilkyWay's Core

From the IO9 blog - Astronomers working with data from the Fermi space telescope, which detects gamma rays, were able to see two enormous structures extending 25k light years above and below the galactic plane. These bubble shaped structures are extremely strong gamma ray emitters invisible to the eye but extremely bright to gamma ray detecting equipment.

Though not fully understanding the dynamics behind what formed the huge globes of gamma rays, scientists speculate that the globes might have been formed by matter infalling onto the super-massive black holes at the center of our Milky Way galaxy. Though there isn't any evidence of a gamma - ray jet now, when the Milky Way was much younger and denser, such a jet may have been much more likely. Here is a NASA film on the discovery.



IO9 article NASA article