Scientists have found a strange ring in space, and they are calling it the ‘ Big Ring ‘. It’s about 1.3 billion light years in size, and it’s made up of galaxies and galaxy structures.
However, these types of things shouldn’t exist. According to the cosmological principle, some of the universe should be similar with no irregularities.
Neither of these two ultra-large structures is easy to explain in our current understanding of the universe.
UCLan PhD student Alexia Lopez
Astronomers are trying to find a way to explain why these things exist. According to Alexia, one possibility is that the Big Ring could be related to Baryonic Acoustic Oscillations (BAOs). These come from oscillations in the early universe, and could possibly appear as spherical shells in the arrangement of galaxies.
However, even this most likely isn’t the case as the Big Ring is too large, and is not spherical. Another theory is Conformal Cyclic Cosmology (CCC), which was proposed by Sir Roger Penrose.
We might never know, but Astronomers hope to find more about the mysterious structure.
Image Credit: UClan (Background: Stellarum)