In a groundbreaking discovery, South Africa’s MeerKAT telescope in the Northern Cape has detected hydrogen gas in 11 galaxies more than four billion light-years away.

Scientists say it’s the first-time individual galaxies this far in the universe have shown any hydrogen signals.

The discovery allows researchers to test a key law of galaxy dynamics and better understand dark matter in galaxies.

Professor Matt Jarvis from the University of Oxford says, “We still only get limited information even with MeerKAT because of that eight-kilometre distance between the dishes. What we’d really like is much better resolution and more sensitivity and this is really where in the future the SKA will come in. So, we’ll move on from what is kind of the discovery of these objects to be able to study them in much greater detail.”

MeerKat Telescope | Scientists uncover new giant galaxy – Kathleen Charlton shares more