Posted on 07/25/2025 6:08:37 AM PDT by Red Badger
While the study is intriguing, additional observations will be essential to verify or challenge its findings.
Astudy analyzing JWST observations of the early universe has uncovered an intriguing mystery: most galaxies appear to be rotating in the same direction. This unexpected pattern, which defies current cosmological models, has led the study's authors to propose a bold possibility: that our universe might exist inside a black hole.
The JWST has allowed astronomers to peer back further into the past than any other infrared or optical telescope, seeing infrared light that was emitted by distant galaxies just 300 million years after the Big Bang.
With the infrared telescope, we were hoping to learn more about the formation of galaxies, as well as clear up mysteries about how supermassive black holes became so large. But we have been thrown a few surprises as we look further back into the past.
One such surprise has just been found by researchers from Kansas State University. They looked at images taken of 263 galaxies in the early universe, which were clear enough to gauge the direction of rotation. Our current models of the universe assume that the universe is pretty much the same in every direction, on large enough scales. Most physicists and astronomers assume and predict that there should be no preferred direction of rotation of galaxies, and that this should be true of the modern and relatively early universe.
But looking at the galaxies, the team found a significant difference between their rotations relative to the Milky Way. A total of 105 of the galaxies (40 percent) rotated in the counterclockwise direction, while 158 (60 percent) rotated in the clockwise direction.
"The analysis of the galaxies was done by quantitative analysis of their shapes, but the difference is so obvious that any person looking at the image can see it," Lior Shamir, associate professor of computer science in the Carl R. Ice College of Engineering, said in a statement.
"There is no need for special skills or knowledge to see that the numbers are different. With the power of the James Webb Space Telescope, anyone can see it."
Similar findings have been reported before, though nothing as dramatic as this.
So, what could be causing this? There are a few options available that would predict a preferred direction of rotation, but they're a little out there.
"If the observation shown here indeed reflects the structure of the Universe, it shows that the early universe was more homogeneous in terms of the directions towards which galaxies rotate, and becomes more chaotic over time while exhibiting a cosmological-scale axis that is close to the Galactic pole," the team explains in their paper.
K-State researcher's study makes puzzling observation about Milky Way, deep space galaxies' rotations Galaxies that rotate in the same way as the Milky Way are highlighted in red, the opposite way in blue. Image Credit: Kansas State University
"Some cosmological models assume a geometry that features a cosmological-scale axis. These include ellipsoidal Universe, dipole big bang, and isotropic inflation. In these cases, the large-scale distribution of the galaxy rotation is aligned in the form of a cosmological-scale axis, and the location of that axis in close proximity to the Galactic pole can be considered a coincidence."
One possibility suggested by the authors is that the preferred direction is the result of the universe being on the interior of a black hole of a larger universe.
"One explanation is that the universe was born rotating. That explanation agrees with theories such as black hole cosmology, which postulates that the entire universe is the interior of a black hole," Shamir said. "But if the universe was indeed born rotating it means that the existing theories about the cosmos are incomplete."
Such an explanation would need a whole lot more evidence to back it up. The team proposes another possibility, though this too could cause some issues. It could be caused by the Doppler shift effect, which can make light appear red or blue-shifted depending on how the emitting object is moving relative to us.
Because of this effect, galaxies rotating the opposite way to the Milky Way appear brighter. If the Milky Way's rotational velocity has more of an effect than astronomers have assumed, this may account for why galaxies spinning in the opposite way to the Milky Way are overrepresented as we look back further and further into the red-shifted universe; they simply appear brighter to us.
"If that is indeed the case, we will need to re-calibrate our distance measurements for the deep universe," Shamir added.
"The re-calibration of distance measurements can also explain several other unsolved questions in cosmology, such as the differences in the expansion rates of the universe and the large galaxies that, according to the existing distance measurements, are expected to be older than the universe itself."
Though an intriguing study, many more observations will be needed to confirm or refute what was found, and then determine which explanation for the data is most likely.
The study was published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
An earlier version of this story was published in March 2025.
If we ARE in a black hole, and assuming that ALL black holes are individual universes, then could the event horizon of those black holes be considered as “Cosmic Foreground Radiation “?
I just enjoy looking at the stars at night, and our own star during the day. Just how far are they going to go with this stuff…..?
Horton heard a Who?
It almost seems like these “scientists” have entirely too much time on their hands. Perhaps cutting some of that grant money is in order.
It almost seems like these “scientists” have entirely too much time on their hands. Perhaps cutting some of that grant money is in order.
Ever been to Chicago?
wy69
How do you know which s the top?
Every one of them is.
(a top, spinning)
It's obviously an arbitrary distinction, applied universally.
Ooh! That's cute!
Except in curved space.
Forgive me for stating the obvious, but to an observer on the other side of the clockwise rotating galaxy, wouldn’t it be rotating counter-clockwise...?
Forgive me for stating the obvious, but to an observer on the other side of the clockwise rotating galaxy, wouldn’t it be rotating counter-clockwise...?
40% vs 60%. I see no big mystery here and don’t think you can conclude with certainty a particular bias.
Just because you have a binary choice does NOT mean you MUST see 50/50 for EVERY sample set.
A spinning disk seen from above might appear to be rotating
in a clockwise direction, but seen from below will seem to
be rotating in a counter-clockwise direction. It would seem
to be more accurate to describe virtually all bodies in the
universe as having rotation about an axis and leave it at that.
OK. I'll even forgive you for arguing against common sense.
Getting it yet?
If I get disoriented, it would be occidentally.
It’s all in perspective.
If we were observing from a different angle, the rotations would be reversed.................
the existing theories about the cosmos are incomplete.”
Gee, ya think?
This is a clear example of the degraded, fouled-up state that science in this country is in...
Utter nonsense for this crap to appear in print...
John Wiley Price will say that the whole universe is racist now.
I make be as dense as a black hole, but since it emits no light, I might be brighter....
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