Cosmic recycling strengthens stellar Spiderweb theory

Eight years ago Dr Nina Hatch , an astronomer at The University of Nottingham , identified a thin haze around a distant galaxy known as the Spiderweb galaxy. She suggested this haze was made up of rapidly forming young stars. But the problem with this research, published in the academic journal Royal Astronomical Society , was that no one knew where this young stellar population could be coming from. Over the intervening years, and with a lack of additional evidence, Dr Hatch, from the School of Physics and Astronomy , began to get increasingly worried about her theory. But no longer. Fellow astronomers, led by Dr Bjorn Emonts from the Centro de Astrobiología in Spain, have observed the first clue suggesting she was right all along. They have identified a giant reservoir of molecular gas that is replenishing the fuel supply to this young galaxy - feeding the development of new stars.