Webb telescope finds organic molecules in galaxy 12 billion light-years away

Twelve billion light-years from Earth, the James Webb Space Telescope has found complex organic molecules in a galaxy whose light left before the universe had lived a tenth of its current life. The discovery, made possible by a rare cosmic alignment that bent and magnified ancient starlight, is the earliest detection of such chemistry in the known universe. Yet what makes this finding most consequential is not what it confirms, but what it unsettles — the long-held assumption that these molecules reliably mark the birthplaces of stars now appears far more complicated than science had supposed.