A dead disk galaxy is a type of galaxy that is no longer able to form new stars. These galaxies are usually massive yet compact, fast spinning disk shaped galaxies. Most of these galaxies stopped forming new stars billions of years ago when the universe was relatively young in age.[1] These types of galaxies are thought to have been formed by an early phase of intense star birth and evolved into a local elliptical galaxy, like that seen in our modern universe.[2]
These types of galaxies challenge astronomers' view of the evolution of galaxies and the chronology of the universe, as they expect to find a more chaotic universe, with many merging galaxies and balls of chaotic stars; instead, dead disk galaxies are flat disks with very little or no stellar formation.[3]
References
edit- ^ "A Massive Dead Disk Galaxy Challenges Theories of Galaxy Evolution – Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie". www.irap.omp.eu. Retrieved 2023-10-29.
- ^ Toft, Sune; Zabl, Johannes; Richard, Johan; Gallazzi, Anna; Zibetti, Stefano; Prescott, Moire; Grillo, Claudio; Man, Allison W. S.; Lee, Nicholas Y.; Gomez-Guijarro, Carlos; Stockmann, Mikkel; Magdis, Georgios; Steinhardt, Charles L. (June 2017). "A massive, dead disk galaxy in the early Universe". Nature. 546 (7659): 510–513. doi:10.1038/nature22388. ISSN 0028-0836. PMC 6485677.
- ^ "Hubble Captures Massive Dead Disk Galaxy that Challenges Theories of Galaxy Evolution - NASA Science". science.nasa.gov. Retrieved 2023-10-29.