GREENBELT, Md., Dec. 19 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists said faint infrared cosmic radiation filling deep space might be a remnant of the Big Bang.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration astrophysicists report finding uneven patches of energy they said might be clusters of the first objects to emerge from the Big Bang.
The astronomers said the objects were either extremely bright stars more than 1,000 times more massive than the sun, or quasars -- large black holes that emit extraordinarily large bursts of energy.
If the patches are star clusters, they might be the first galaxies -- smaller than most known galaxies, yet containing a mass on the scale of 1 million suns.
"Observing the cosmic infrared background is like watching distant fireworks from within a brightly lit city," said lead author Alexander Kashlinsky of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "While we can't resolve each spark in the fireworks, we can see the large scale structures and their glow."
Kashlinsky, Richard Arendt, John Mather and S. Harvey Moseley -- all from Goddard -- are to publish their findings in two papers in the Jan. 1 issue of the Astrophysical Journal.
