Astronomers have detected an enormous radio jet in the distant universe, spanning twice the width of the Milky Way galaxy. This ancient object formed when the universe was less than 10% of its current age (13.8 billion years), making it the largest radio jet ever observed from this early period.
The discovery, published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters on February 6, 2025, was led by Anniek Gloudemans, a postdoctoral fellow at NOIRLab. Using the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) telescope in Europe and follow-up observations with Gemini North in Hawaii and the Hobby-Eberly Telescope in Texas, the team identified a two-lobed radio jet spanning at least 200,000 light-years.
The quasar J1601+3102, which produced the jet, formed when the universe was only 1.2 billion years old. Unlike typical quasars, this one is relatively small, weighing 450 million times the mass of the Sun. The jet also exhibits asymmetry in distance and brightness, suggesting it formed in an extreme environment.
The yellow streaks in this composite image, made using multiple telescopes, represent the jet releasing from the quasar. NOIRLab/LOFAR/DECaLS/DESI Legacy Imaging
This discovery challenges the belief that only exceptionally massive black holes can generate such jets. It also opens the door for finding more similar objects, despite the difficulty of detecting radio jets in the early universe due to cosmic microwave background interference.
Gloudemans and her team plan further observations to explore how these powerful jets form and influence galaxy evolution. As she noted, "Jets have been found even earlier in the universe, but never of this monster size."
