A team of astronomers have recently discovered a massive quiescent galaxy, known as XMM-2599, that formed only 2.6 billion years after the Big Bang. This discovery challenges the widely accepted theory that such galaxies take much longer to form and is a major step forward in our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution.

At a distance of approximately 12.5 billion light-years away, XMM-2599 is one of the most distant quiescent galaxies ever discovered. The remarkable feat was made possible by the combined efforts of the X-ray Multi-Mirror Mission (XMM-Newton) and the Subaru Telescope.

The team of astronomers found that XMM-2599 had already grown to its full size and had stopped forming stars by the time it was only 2.6 billion years old. This is much earlier than expected and suggests that massive galaxies can form much more quickly than was previously thought. The team believes that this could be due to a number of factors, such as the merger of two smaller galaxies or the rapid growth of a single massive galaxy.

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source: Phys.org