The NASA Hubble space telescope's Ultra Deep Field image shows nearly 10,000 galaxies deep in the core of our universe. A largely empty patch of sky for ground-based observatories, Hubble's long exposure sees galaxies of all ages, shapes and sizes from the earliest times of our universe.

The smallest red galaxies may have existed when the universe was only 800 million years old, compared to the elliptical and spiral galaxies that developed about 1 billion years ago. Galaxies interact as gravitational fields warp their shapes, remnants of the chaotic youth of the universe.

Image description:

Galaxies decorate the darkness of space in all shapes, colours and sizes. Blue and Green correspond to the colours that the human eye sees. Red represents near-infrared light, which is invisible to the human eye.