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Five of the most exciting telescope pictures of the universe

Some of these objects are among the oldest and most distant known. Here we’re seeing light from ancient stars whose local contemporaries have long since been extinguished.

The oldest galaxies formed during the epoch of reionisation, when the tenuous gas in the universe first became bathed in starlight which was capable of separating electrons from hydrogen. This was the last major change in properties of the universe as a whole.

The fact that light carries so much information, allowing us to piece together the history of the universe, is remarkable. The launch of the James Webb Space Telescope will give us some vastly improved infrared images, and will inevitably raise new questions to challenge future generations of scientists.

U.K.’s Wind Capacity Set for Big Boost After Record Auction

Scotland awarded rights for a massive offshore wind development more than twice the size of the U.K.’s current capacity, in a move that surprised the market for its scale and was welcomed by environmentalists.

The list of winning projects in the tender adds up to nearly 25 gigawatts, far bigger than the 10 gigawatts that Scottish authorities had anticipated ultimately being built.