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Astronomers find galaxy similar to Milky Way

It’s more than 12 billion light-years away

Astronomers find galaxy similar to Milky Way (Rizzo et al./ALMA/European Southern Observatory)

In a galaxy far, far away. Sorry, this isn't the beginning of Star Wars, but it may be even cooler because it's real.

This isn’t the eye of Sauron from “Lord of the Rings” either. It’s a galaxy and astronomers say it looks a lot like ours, a Milky way doppelganger if you will.

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This picture was published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

The galaxy is more than 12 billion light years away from ours which means we're seeing this galaxy as it appeared when the universe was only 1.4 billion years old.

It's been named SPT048-47.

Clearly, the Milky Way got the better name.

Astronomers have always thought galaxies were basically wild and unformed in the early years of the universe but seeing this galaxy that’s calm and well-ordered just like ours completely changes their way of thinking.


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