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Could the age of the universe be twice as old as current estimates suggest?
Thousands of small galaxies appear across this view. Their colors vary. Some are shades of orange, while others are white. Most appear as fuzzy ovals, but a few have distinct spiral arms. In front of the galaxies are several foreground stars. Most appear blue, and the bright stars have diffraction spikes, forming an eight-pointed star shape. There are also many thin, long, orange arcs that curve around the center of the image.

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has produced the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb’s First Deep Field, this image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is rich with detail.

Thousands of galaxies—including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared—have appeared in Webb’s view for the first time. The image shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it appeared 4.6 billion years ago. The combined mass of this galaxy cluster acts as a gravitational lens, magnifying much more distant galaxies behind it.

Webb’s Near-Infra Red Cam has brought those distant galaxies into sharp focus—they have tiny, faint structures that have never been seen before, including star clusters and diffuse features.

(Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI)

Could the age of the universe be twice as old as current estimates suggest?

Penn Professors Vijay Balasubramanian and Mark Devlin offer a broader understanding of a recent paper’s claim that the universe could be 26.7 billion years old.
Euclid Space Telescope launches exciting new possibilities
Shot of Falcon 9 Rocket launching from Cape Canaveral at Kennedy Space Center

The European Space Agency’s latest astrophysics mission, Euclid, lifted off on a Space X Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA, at 17:12 CEST on 1 July 2023. Euclid has now started its month-long journey to Sun-Earth Lagrange point L2, located 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, in the opposite direction from the Sun.

(Image: iStock / Robert Michaud)

Euclid Space Telescope launches exciting new possibilities

Professors of physics and astronomy Bhuvnesh Jain, Mark Trodden, and Gary Bernstein discuss the coming research findings from the European Space Agency’s Euclid Space Telescope.
Exploring the relationship between cooking and scientific discovery
Laser tomography of champagne glasses.

Laser tomography of champagne glasses: (left and right) counter-rotating convection cells self-organize at the air-champagne interface, and (center) stabilized eddies in a surface-treated glass.

(Image: Fabien Beaumont, Gérard Liger-Belair, and Guillaume Polidori)

Exploring the relationship between cooking and scientific discovery

Penn physicist Arnold Mathijssen and colleagues have authored a review article discussing the history of food innovations and the current scientific breakthroughs that are changing the way we eat.
On a different wavelength, Nader Engheta leads a community in light
nader engheta in his lab

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On a different wavelength, Nader Engheta leads a community in light

2023 Franklin Medal winner Engheta is one of the world’s biggest names in wave physics. The Penn Engineering professor is renowned for his unique approach to science, combining technical brilliance, creativity, and care.

Devorah Fischler

A grant to upgrade Simons Observatory
researching working in simons observatory

The Devlin lab are working on creating an extremely cold environment (nearly -460 degrees Fahrenheit) so that the new Simons Observatory can detect cosmic microwave background (CMB), the residual radiation left behind by the Big Bang. Work done at the High Bay is essential for keeping the project from falling further behind after shutdown delays.

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A grant to upgrade Simons Observatory

Mark Devlin and colleagues have been awarded an NSF grant to upgrade the prominent observatory in the high Atacama Desert in Northern Chile.
New findings reveal the most detailed mass map of dark matter
the Atacama Cosmology Telescope in the foreground and the desert and mountains of chile in the background

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope in Chile is just one site Penn faculty are conducting ongoing global research.

(Image: Debra Kellner)

New findings reveal the most detailed mass map of dark matter

Research led by the Atacama Cosmology Telescope collaboration maps the universe’s cosmic growth supporting Einstein's theory of general relativity.
The Big Bang at 75
An image of a nebula, a giant cloud of dust and gas in space.

Where did the cosmos come from? This question has long been part of human speculation, says Vijay Balasubramanian. Today, thanks to scientists like Ralph Alpher and George Gamow, we have a rough picture: Some 13 billion years ago, the universe was a hot, dense state that cooled as it expanded. 

(Image: NASA via Unsplash.)

  • Q&A

    • The Big Bang at 75

    Theoretical physicist Vijay Balasubramanian discusses the 75th anniversary of the alpha-beta-gamma paper, what we know—and don’t know—about the universe and the “very big gaps” left to discover.

    Kristina Linnea García

    New neutrino detection method
    Aview inside the SNO detector when filled with water.

    A view inside the SNO detector when filled with water. In the background, there are 9,000 photomultiplier tubes that detect photons and the acrylic vessel that (now) holds liquid scintillator. The ropes that crisscross on the outside hold it down when the scintillator is added to prevent it from floating upwards. The acrylic vessel is 12 m wide, about half the width of an Olympic-sized swimming pool. The detector is located in SNOLAB, a research facility located 2km underground near Sudbury, Canada.

    (Image: SNO+ Collaboration)

    New neutrino detection method

    Research by Joshua Klein of the School of Arts & Science and an international team has found a way to detect distant subatomic particles using water.