This is a false color image of the galaxy LAEJ095950.99+021219.1 . In this image, blue corresponds to optical light (wavelength near 500 nm), red to near-infrared light (wavelength near 920 nm), and green to the narrow range of wavelengths admitted by the narrow bandpass filter (around 968 nm). LAEJ095950.99+021219.1 appears as the green source near the center of the image cutout. The image shows about 1/6000 of the area that was surveyed. Credit: James Rhoads
The recently discovered LAEJ095950.99+021219.1 galaxy is extremely faint and was detected by the light emitted by ionized hydrogen. The search employed a technique ASU professors James Rhoads and Sangeeta Malhotra pioneered that uses special narrowband filters that allow a small wavelength range of light through. In this photo, a narrowband filter is being mounted in a filter holder for use in the instrument IMACS (the Inamori-Magellan Areal Camera & Spectrograph). IMACS was built by a team at the Observatories of the Carnegie Institute of Washington, led by Alan Dressler. Credit: James Rhoads
A team of astronomers led by ASU professors James Rhoads and Sangeeta Malhotra identified a remote galaxy after scanning a large patch of sky with the Magellan Telescopes in the southern reaches of Chile's Atacama Desert, which are among Arizona's telescope resources. Visible in this photo are both Magellan telescopes in the late afternoon, as seen from the path up to the telescopes. The Arizona telescope system provides access to the Large Binocular Telescope on Mt. Graham, the 6.5 meter MMT on Mt. Hopkins, the 2.2 meter Bok telescope on Kitt Peak (all in Arizona), and the twin 6.5 meter Magellan telescopes at Las Campanas Observatories in Chile, along with several smaller telescopes. The Magellan telescopes were built by the Carnegie Institution of Washington on behalf of the Magellan Project, a collaborative effort by the Carnegie Institution, University of Arizona, Harvard University, University of Michigan, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Credit: James Rhoads