• The results related to Cloud-9 were published in ‘The Astrophysical Journal Letters’, and later presented at the 247th meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Phoenix.

• What? Discovery of starless, dark-matter dominated cloud
• Discovered by: NASA’s Hubble Telescope
• Found Near: Messier 94 (M94)
• Distance from Earth: 14 million light-years
• Nicknamed: Cloud-9
• Key Specifications:
• Neutral Hydrogen gas (about 1 million solar masses);
• 4,900 light-years in diameter;
• dark matter (around 5 billion solar masses)

About Cloud-9:
Location: This newly discovered dark matter-dominated cloud, considered a ‘relic’ or remnant of early galaxy formation, is located 14 million light-years from Earth near the spiral galaxy Messier 94 (M94).
Composition: Cloud-9 is also called a Reionization-Limited HI Cloud (RELHIC) as both have nearly same composition.

• For instance both REHLIC and Cloud-9 are composed of neutral hydrogen (with a mass of about 1 million times that of the Sun) and dominated by dark matter and have same diameter i.e. about 4,900 light-years.
• The mass of Cloud-9’s dark matter is projected to be about 5 billion solar masses.

Key Feature: Cloud-9 is invisible in visible light and only detectable by its hydrogen, which makes it a rare ‘fossil’ from the universe early days.
Discovery Timeline:  Discovered in 2023 via China’s Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope(FAST) radio telescope and  in 2025  Very Large Array(VLA)/Green Bank Telescope(GBT) confirm neutral hydrogen core. In Jan 2026 Hubble’s Advanced Camera finds no stars within boundaries.