Simple Explanation of Alignment of Quasar Polarization with Large Scale Structures

As reported in Science News November 20, 2014, "Galaxies may be aligned across 1 billion light-years," raising questions about the formation of large scale structures in the universe. 

ESO/M. KORNMESSER

Here is their report:

The cores of several distant galaxies, spread out across roughly 1 billion light-years, appear to mysteriously align with one another. If confirmed, the new observations could be a hint of some unknown mechanism that shapes the largest structures in the universe.

Damien Hutsemékers, an astrophysicist at the University of Liège in Belgium, and colleagues used the Very Large Telescope in northern Chile to measure the orientations of 19 quasars, blazing disks of gas that swirl around supermassive black holes in the centers of some galaxies. Each of the quasars lives in one of four groups that are about 13 billion light-years away and centered on the constellation Leo. Within the groups, powerful jets of charged particles that spew from the quasars seem to point in nearly the same direction, the researchers report November 19 in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

The conclusions are on shaky ground, says Mike DiPompeo, an astrophysicist at the University of Wyoming. With only 19 quasars, the alignments could be just a coincidence. But even with a small sample, he finds the results intriguing and worthy of further investigation. It would be surprising, he says, if quasars knew how their neighbors were aligned. 

Citations:  D. Hutsemékers et al. Alignment of quasar polarizations with large-scale structures. Astronomy & Astrophysics. Published online November 19, 2014. doi: 10.1051/0004-6361/201424631.

For my own Simple Explanation of a toroidal mechanism that can explain this alignment of quasars, please read my article concerning a similar puzzling alignment of planetary nebulae in our own galaxy.