Astronomers detect ancient hydrogen signal that could help map the Universe

Astronomers have detected an exceptionally faint hydrogen radio signal from billions of light-years away using South Africa’s MeerKAT telescope. Instead of finding galaxies one at a time, the technique measures their combined hydrogen glow across enormous stretches of space. The successful detection shows that astronomers may soon be able to create much larger 3D maps of the Universe.

Astronomers detect ancient hydrogen signal that could help map the Universe. Com Astronomers have directly detected an extraordinarily faint radio signal from hydrogen gas billions of light-years away, demonstrating a promising new method for mapping the vast structure of the Universe. The international team, led by researchers at the University of Manchester and the University of the Western Cape, used South Africa’s MeerKAT radio telescope to measure emissions from neutral hydrogen dating to a period when the Universe was several billion years younger than it is today.

Published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, the results highlight the growing potential of hydrogen intensity mapping, a technique designed to survey enormous regions of space far more efficiently than methods that rely on identifying galaxies individually. Mapping the Universe With Hydrogen Neutral hydrogen naturally gives off a very weak radio emission known as the 21-centimeter line. Because the Universe is expanding, this signal becomes stretched to longer wavelengths as it travels through space.