A dusty, normal galaxy in the epoch of reionization

Understand

Candidates for the modest galaxies that formed most of the stars in the early universe, at redshifts $z > 7$, have been found in large numbers with extremely deep restframe-UV imaging.

• But it has proved difficult for existing spectrographs to characterise them in the UV.
• The detailed properties of these galaxies could be measured from dust and cool gas emission at far-infrared wavelengths if the galaxies have become sufficiently enriched in dust and metals.
• So far, however, the most distant UV-selected galaxy detected in dust emission is only at $z = 3.25$, and recent results have cast doubt on whether dust and molecules can be found in typical galaxies at this early epoch.