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JADES-GS-z13-1 Spectrum Graphic

A graph labeled “JADES-GS-Z13-1, The Onset of Reionization, NIRSpec, PRISM.” The x-axis is labeled “Wavelength of Light, microns” and extends from about 0.5 microns to 4.0 microns, with tick marks every 0.5 microns from 1.0 to 4.0. The y-axis is labeled “Brightness” and has a horizontal, dashed line about a third of the way up from the bottom. An up arrow is labeled “brighter” at the top of the y-axis, and a down arrow is labeled “dimmer.” A jagged blue line runs horizontally across the graph. It fluctuates above and below the dashed line until reaching a wavelength of about 1.7 microns, at which point it peaks before gradually decreasing again, and going just below the dashed line. The wavelength where the emission peaks has an arrow pointing down labeled “Lyman-alpha emission, z = 13.05.”

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has detected unexpected light from a distant galaxy. The galaxy JADES-GS-z13-1, observed just 330 million years after the big bang (corresponding to a redshift of z=13.05), shows bright emission from hydrogen known as Lyman-alpha emission. This is surprising because that emission should have been absorbed by a dense fog of neutral hydrogen that suffused the early universe. In this graphic, the solid blue line shows the cleaned, averaged spectrum while the faint blue shows the error bars.

  • Release Date
    March 26, 2025
  • Science Release
    NASA’s Webb Sees Galaxy Mysteriously Clearing Fog of Early Universe
    Read the release
  • Credit
    Illustration: NASA, ESA, CSA, Stefano Carniani (Scuola Normale Superiore), P. Jakobsen (University of Copenhagen), Joseph Olmsted (STScI)

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Related Images & Videos

A two panel image. At left, hundreds of tiny galaxies are scattered across the black background of space. A small portion of the sky near the bottom is outlined with a white box. Lines extend from the corners of the box to the right panel. At right, a small red dot at the middle is highlighted with white lines and labeled redshift z = 13. At upper left, a face-on spiral galaxy is labeled z = 0.63. At lower right, an edge-on spiral galaxy is labeled z = 0.70. A handful of other small background galaxies are seen against the black background of space. At lower right, the panel is labeled JADES-GS-z-13-1.

JADES-GS-z13-1 in the GOODS-S field (NIRCam Image)

The incredibly distant galaxy JADES-GS-z13-1, observed just 330 million years after the big bang, was initially discovered with deep imaging from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera). Now, an international team of astronomers definitively has...

A small red dot is in the middle of the image. To its upper left is a face-on spiral galaxy, and to its lower right is an edge-on spiral galaxy. A handful of other small background galaxies are seen against the black background of space.

JADES-GS-z13-1 (NIRCam Close-Up)

This image shows the galaxy JADES GS-z13-1 (the red dot at center), imaged with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) as part of the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES) program. These data from NIRCam allowed researchers to identify...

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Last Updated
Nov 14, 2025
Contact
Media

Laura Betz
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
laura.e.betz@nasa.gov

Illustration Credit

NASA, ESA, CSA, Stefano Carniani (Scuola Normale Superiore), P. Jakobsen (University of Copenhagen), Joseph Olmsted (STScI)

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