A1689-zD1
A1689-zD1 is a galaxy in the Virgo constellation. It was a candidate for the most distant and therefore earliest-observed galaxy discovered as of February 2008[update], based on a photometric redshift.[1][2] If the redshift, z~7.6,[3] is correct, it would explain why the galaxy's faint light reaches us at infrared wavelengths. It could only be observed with Hubble Space Telescope's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) and the Spitzer Space Telescope's Infrared Array Camera exploiting the natural phenomenon of gravitational lensing: the galaxy cluster Abell 1689, which lies between Earth and A1689-zD1, at a distance of 2.2 billion light-years from us, functions as a natural "magnifying glass" for the light from the far more distant galaxy which lies directly behind it, at 700 million years after the Big Bang, as seen from Earth.[1] See alsoReferences
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