Zooming in on 9io9

This video takes us on a journey from our home in the Milky Way to a galaxy far, far away, 9io9. Using ALMA, astronomers have recently detected a galaxy-wide magnetic field in 9io9, making it the furthest ever detection of a galactic magnetic field. 9io9 is so far away its light has taken more than 11 billion years to reach us: we see it as it was when the Universe was only 2.5 billion years old.

We first see the night sky in visible light, and then switch to infrared light when we finally reach 9io9. Here, the galaxy appears as a faint reddish arc curved around a bright nearby galaxy. We then see the ALMA image of 9io9 at millimetre wavelengths, with the orientation of the magnetic field indicated by overlaid curves.