The team notes that this discovery connects a variety of scientific fields. “These results provide direct evidence that indicates proto-globular clusters formed in faint galaxies during the reionisation era, which contributes to our understanding of how these galaxies have succeeded in reionising the Universe,” explained Angela.

This discovery helps the astronomers to better understand how globular clusters formed and in what kind of conditions. "For instance, the high stellar densities found in the clusters provide us with the first indication of the processes taking place in their interiors, giving new insights into the possible formation of very massive stars and black hole seeds, which are both important for galaxy evolution,” added Angela.

In the future, the team hopes to observe many more galaxies in similar detail. “I am confident there are other systems like this waiting to be uncovered in the early Universe, enabling us to further our understanding of early galaxies,” said Eros Vanzella from the National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF) in Bologna, Italy, one of the main contributors to the work.

In the meantime, the team is preparing for further observations and spectroscopy with Webb. “We plan to study this galaxy with Webb’s NIRSpec and MIRI instruments in Cycle 3,” added Larry. “The NIRSpec observations will allow us to confirm the redshift of the galaxy and to study the ultraviolet emission of the star clusters, which will be used to study their physical properties in more detail. The MIRI observations will allow us to study the properties of ionised gas." The spectroscopic observations will also allow the team to map how active the sites of star formation are.

These results have been published today in Nature. The data for this result were captured under Webb observing programme #4212 (PI: L. Bradley).

More information

Webb is the largest, most powerful telescope ever launched into space. Under an international collaboration agreement, ESA provided the telescope’s launch service, using the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. Working with partners, ESA was responsible for the development and qualification of Ariane 5 adaptations for the Webb mission and for the procurement of the launch service by Arianespace. ESA also provided the workhorse spectrograph NIRSpec and 50% of the mid-infrared instrument MIRI, which was designed and built by a consortium of nationally funded European Institutes (The MIRI European Consortium) in partnership with JPL and the University of Arizona.

Webb is an international partnership between NASA, ESA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

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