What Causes Some Galaxies to Eject Their Gas into Space and Die Young

Scientists have found that some galaxies die young. It turns out that galaxies can die early because the gas they need to make new stars is suddenly ejected.

Most galaxies age slowly as they run out of the raw materials needed for growth over billions of years. Yet now, scientists believe that it's possible for these galaxies to shoot out their gas early on. This may cause them to die out prematurely.

There are two main types of galaxies; there are "blue" galaxies that are still actively making new stars and "red" galaxies that have stopped growing. Most galaxies transition from blue to red over time, but some galaxies seem to make this transition suddenly after just a billion years.

In order to better understand this phenomenon, the researchers examined galaxies on the cusp of shutting down. Each of these galaxies were at a different stage of the transition. They found that all of the galaxies approaching this stage had already expelled most of their gas.

"One possibility is that it could be blown out of the galaxy's supermassive black hole," said Ivy Wong, one of the researchers, in a news release. "Another possibility is that the gas could be ripped out by a neighboring galaxy, although the galaxies in the pilot project are all isolated and don't appear to have others nearby."

The findings reveal a bit more about galaxy evolution. This, in turn, may allow researchers to discover the cause of this sudden shutdown in star formation.

The findings are published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

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