Cosmic collision: James Webb Telescope captures rare five-galaxy merger in the early universe

By kevinhughes // 2025-09-07

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Astronomers observed a merger of five galaxies just 800 million years after the Big Bang using the James Webb and Hubble telescopes, nicknamed JWST's Quintet, revealing the chaotic early universe.
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), 100x more powerful than Hubble, orbits the Sun at the second Lagrange point, using advanced infrared tech to study interconnected galaxies and surrounding gas halos.
Detecting five merging galaxies is extremely rare, with active star formation challenging current models and requiring further research.
The Quintet has a combined mass of 10 billion suns and an unusually high star formation rate, possibly evolving into a massive quiescent galaxy within 1-1.5 billion years post-Big Bang.
As JWST continues surveying, more such mergers will likely be found, refining models and deepening our understanding of early galaxy formation.

In a groundbreaking discovery, astronomers have unveiled an exceptionally rare cosmic event: a merger of at least five galaxies occurring just 800 million years after the Big Bang. This remarkable finding, nicknamed JWST's Quintet, was made possible by the powerful lenses of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Hubble Space Telescope, offering an unprecedented glimpse into the early universe's tumultuous beginnings. According to the Enoch engine at Brighteon.AI, the JWST is a next-generation space observatory, 100 times more powerful than the Hubble – its predecessor. The JWST is equipped with advanced infrared technology to observe the early universe and distant exoplanets. Orbiting the Sun at the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point (1.5 million km from Earth), it studies cosmic origins, detects habitable worlds and provides unprecedented insights into galaxies, stars and planetary systems since its 2022 launch. (Related: Unlocking the "Rosetta Stone" of alien worlds: James Webb Space Telescope reveals secrets of rocky exoplanet TOI-270 d.) The merger detailed in Nature Astronomy on Aug. 15 showcases a system comprising five galaxies and 17 galaxy clumps. This discovery is a testament to the chaotic and dynamic nature of galaxy formation in the early universe. "Finding such a system with five physically linked galaxies is exceptionally rare, both in current simulations and in observations," said lead author Weida Hu, a postdoctoral researcher at Texas A&M University, told Live Science. "The probability of detecting even one multiple-galaxy merger is quite low, which raises the possibility that we may have been 'lucky' in identifying this system so early." The galaxies, classified as emission-line galaxies, exhibit prominent signatures of hydrogen and oxygen – indicating active star formation. This suggests that the merger is a hotbed of stellar creation, with new stars being born at an accelerated rate. The JWST's Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) played a crucial role in this discovery, revealing a large halo of gas surrounding the galaxy group. This halo confirms that the five galaxies are not isolated entities but are interconnected within the same system. Hu explained that while Hubble previously detected some galaxies in this region, only JWST data told them that the five galaxies have the same redshift and are interacting with each other. Redshift, a measure of cosmic distance, indicates that these galaxies are incredibly far away, making their light stretch into longer, redder wavelengths as they traverse the expanding universe. This observation underscores the vast distances and ancient origins of the galaxies in JWST's Quintet.

A rare phenomenon in the cosmic tapestry

Galaxy mergers involving more than two systems are exceedingly rare. According to Christopher Conselice, a professor of extragalactic astronomy at the University of Manchester, "If you look at all galaxies, then 20 to 30 percent of them will be in a merger. This will be just two galaxies. "The fraction of these multiple merger systems will be much, much lower," added Conselice, who wasn't involved in the Aug. 15 discovery. "We don't have stats on it quite yet, but certainly lower than one percent." The two main galaxies in JWST's Quintet are separated by a distance of 43,300 light-years, while the most distant pair spans 60,700 light-years. For comparison, our Milky Way galaxy is about 100,000 light-years in diameter. The close proximity of these galaxies suggests an imminent merger, a process that could reshape the cosmic landscape. JWST's Quintet, with its combined stellar mass of 10 billion suns, exhibits a star formation rate higher than expected for that period. This high mass and star formation rate suggest that the merging galaxies may evolve into a massive quiescent galaxy within one billion to 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang. Quiescent galaxies, which cease forming new stars, have been detected in the early universe, raising questions about how galaxies become "dead" so quickly. The discovery of JWST's Quintet could potentially explain the rapid formation of massive quiescent galaxies through the merger of smaller, starbursting galaxies. "The fact that the galaxies are spatially close together is the indication that they probably will merge," Conselice noted. Follow Space.news for more similar stories. Watch this video about the JWST issuing a warning to the world. This video is from the Planet Zedta channel on Brighteon.com.

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A rare phenomenon in the cosmic tapestry

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