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image depicting Element found for the first time in a galaxy billions of light-years away

Element found for the first time in a galaxy billions of light-years away

 

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For the first time, astronomers have detected an element in a galaxy that is more than 12 billion light-years away. This element, fluorine, can be found in our bones and teeth as fluoride. The toothpaste we use every day also has fluoride. This is the first time that fluorine has been detected so far back in the past.

Scientists used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile for this discovery. They found that fluorine was present as hydrogen fluoride in gas clouds of the NGP-190387 galaxy.

They say that the stars that released fluorine throughout the universe likely lived fast and died young. And these were likely Wolf-Rayet stars.

What are Wold Rayet stars?

Wolf Rayet stars are incredibly massive, but very short-live stars. They survive only for a few million years. They are also very rare – only one out of a hundred million stars are massive enough to be Wolf-Rayets.

Scientists had earlier believed that Wolf Rayet Stars released fluorine throughout the universe. But this study confirms it.

Moreover, before this discovery, fluorine had only been detected in our Milky Way galaxy and its neighbours. But this detection shows that the element existed early, at a time when the universe start.

 

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