Most distant galaxy yet is found 13.1 billion light years away

Scientists have discovered the most distant galaxy ever confirmed, whose light took more than 13 billion years to reach earth, providing a snapshot of the early universe.

One curious trait about the record-breaker is that it forms stars at an incredible rate, about 330 a year - more than a hundred times faster than our Milky Way galaxy. This could be a trademark of the universe's early days, when hydrogen gas for star formation was much more plentiful.

"We wanted to figure out how galaxies evolve," said Steven Finkelstein, lead author and University of Texas astronomer. "One way to do that is to push back deeper and deeper into the history of the universe."

The study was published online in the journal Nature.

At first, the landmark discovery was somewhat of a let-down, the scientists said.

The team used images from the Hubble space telescope to identify 43 possible faraway galaxies and then used state-of-the-art spectrographic equipment at an observatory in Hawaii to confirm their distances. In the end, Finkelstein and his colleagues could retrieve data from only this lone galaxy.