NASA’s James Webb telescope spots strange 13 billion-year-old galaxy much too complex to exist

A 13 billion-year-old galaxy has been located that challenges our current understanding of the universe.

The ancient galaxy, called ZF-UDS-7329, was spotted with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). This telescope was specifically designed to observe these types of galaxies and help us to see into the early years of the universe.

However, scientists claim that ZF-UDS-7329 is 'too complex to exist that early in the universe' in the sense that a galaxy this size should not have existed just 800 million years after the Big Bang.

The galaxy is 'too complex to exist that early in the universe' / JWST NIRCAM

According to Karl Glazebrook, an astronomer at the Swinburne University of Technology who led the research team, scientists had been tracking the galaxy for a while, but has never been able to get a close enough look until the JWST came into play.

Now, scientists have finally been able to peer at the galaxy which is about 11.5 billion years in our past. Since light travels at a fixed speed through space, the image of these early galaxies is only able to be observed now.

Scientists are now questioning what the discovery means for our current understanding of cosmology.

One of the study's scientists wrote how it points to 'significant gaps in our understanding' of how early stars and galaxies formed.

Study co-author Claudia Lagos, and an associate professor of astronomy from the University of Western Australia, stated: 'Having these extremely massive galaxies so early in the universe is posing significant challenges to our standard model of cosmology.'

Scientists believe it its discovery points to 'significant gaps in our understanding' /Javier Zayas Photography/Getty

Another study author and astronomer at the Swinburne University of Technology, Themiya Nanayakkara, added: 'This pushes the boundaries of our current understanding of how galaxies form and evolve.

'The key question now is how they form so fast, very early in the Universe, and what mysterious mechanisms lead to stopping them from forming stars abruptly when the rest of the Universe is doing so.'

However, Glazebrook advised the researchers not to throw out our current way of thinking altogether, in such early days, as more evidence is needed to justify the recent observations.

'This result sets a new record for this phenomenon. Although it is very striking, it is only one object. But we hope to find more; and if we do this will really upset our ideas of galaxy formation,' the study leader concluded.