It did not look dramatic at first. Just a soft red speck buried in a sea of distant light. Easy to miss. Easy to doubt. But this glow had been traveling for billions of years before reaching Earth. It began its journey when the universe was still in its infancy. Before stars like our sun existed. Before planets formed. When scientists finally understood how far back they were looking, everything else seemed to fade into the background.
A telescope built to look further than ever before
In the summer of 2022, the James Webb Space Telescope began sending back images from deep space. It cost $10 billion and had one big mission: look further than any telescope in history.
Looking further in space means looking further back in time. Light takes time to travel. So when a telescope sees something extremely far away, it is actually seeing something extremely old.
Webb has become famous for one special skill. It can spot very early galaxies — galaxies that formed not long after the Big Bang. And again and again, it keeps breaking its own records.
Every time scientists think they have found the earliest known galaxy, Webb goes a little further.
The early universe was not as quiet as expected
Before this telescope launched, many experts believed the very early universe would be fairly calm. They did not expect to see many bright galaxies so soon after everything began.
But Webb told a different story.
Instead of emptiness, it found activity. Instead of just a few early galaxies, it revealed over 100 more relatively bright galaxies than scientists had predicted based on older observations.
That was already surprising.
It suggested that the universe may have started building galaxies faster than expected. The cosmic “dark ages” might not have lasted as long as once thought.
Then came an even deeper look. An even fainter red signal. One that would push the timeline closer to the beginning than ever before.
The most distant object ever seen
The James Webb Space Telescope has now detected a galaxy that existed just 280 million years after the Big Bang.
The research team called it a “cosmic miracle.”
Right now, it holds the title of the most distant object known to humanity.
The galaxy has been given the name MoM z14, short for what researchers describe as the “mother of all early galaxies.” Its distance slightly surpasses the previous record holder, a galaxy known as JADES-GS-z14-0, which existed about 300 million years after the Big Bang.
That difference — about 20 million years — may not sound like much. But when talking about the beginning of the universe, it is a significant step closer to the start of everything.
“First and foremost, at the moment, this is the most distant object known to humanity,” said Pieter van Dokkum, a Yale University professor involved in the research. He added that this title changes from time to time, but each time it happens, it is a moment worth reflecting on.
MoM z14 existed when the universe was only 280 million years old. To make that easier to imagine, van Dokkum pointed out something surprising: sharks have been around on Earth longer than the universe had existed when this galaxy was shining.
The team did not just spot the galaxy. Using Webb, they were also able to determine some of its characteristics. It is not just a faint dot. It is a real object from a time incredibly close to the Big Bang.
A new view of our cosmic beginnings
This discovery is about more than breaking a record.
Webb was not expected to find galaxies this early in its mission. Yet it keeps doing exactly that. And each time it does, scientists are forced to rethink how quickly the universe formed its first structures.
If bright galaxies already existed just 280 million years after the Big Bang, then the early universe may have been more active than once believed.
MoM z14 now stands as the farthest known object ever detected. But history suggests that this record may not last long.
Somewhere in the darkness, even older light could already be on its way toward us.
And when it finally arrives, we may once again realize that the universe still has deeper chapters left to reveal.