Scientists at the University of Central Lancashire have discovered a gigantic, ring-shaped structure in space.
It is 1.3bn light-years in diameter and appears to be roughly 15 times the size of the Moon in the night sky as seen from Earth.
Named the Big Ring by the astronomers, it is made up of galaxies and galaxy clusters.
They say that it is so big it challenges our understanding of the universe.
It cannot be seen with the naked eye. It is really distant and identifying all the galaxies that make up the bigger structure has taken a lot of time and computing power.
Such large structures should not exist according to one of the guiding principles of astronomy, called the cosmological principle. This states that all matter is spread smoothly across the Universe.
Although stars, planets and galaxies are huge clumps of matter in our eyes, in the context of the size of the universe they are insignificant – and the theory is that much bigger patches of matter should not form.
The Big Ring is by no means the first likely violation of the cosmological principle and so suggests that there is another, yet to be discovered, factor at play.
According to Dr Robert Massey, deputy director of the Royal Astronomical Society, the evidence for a rethink of what has been a central plank of astronomy is growing.
“This is the seventh large structure discovered in the universe that contradicts the idea that the cosmos is smooth on the largest scales. If these structures are real, then it’s definitely food for thought for cosmologists and the accepted thinking on how the universe has evolved over time,” he said.
