The “Space Rocks” of the Carina Nebula. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb ERO Production Team/Released via Reuters
A multicolored seascape of glowing gas and dust that is the chaotic cradle of newborn solar systems. A complex balloon blown into space by a dying star. A cluster of galaxies in slow motion that reveals the hidden architecture of destruction. A cosmic magnifier that uses a massive concentration of matter to probe the limits of the visible universe. And a wavy series of data points that bears the signature of water vapor in the atmosphere of a distant world.
With one startling sight after another, the newly commissioned James Webb Space Telescope is signaling an epochal change in astronomers’ ability to observe and understand our universe.
First and foremost, this week’s release of Webb’s first color images confirms its typical ability to perceive targets that are more distant and fainter than any telescope has seen before. But they also show that it is a universal discovery engine that can be applied to a wide range of cosmic mysteries.
“We are turning the page on many, many new chapters in astrophysics. Everything is going to change completely,” said René Doyon, a professor of astronomy at the University of Montreal and principal investigator at Canada’s Webb Science Team.
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Canada’s role in developing and building one of Webb’s four science instruments will give the country’s scientists a guaranteed share of the telescope’s time. The European Space Agency is also a partner. But NASA is the main driver and payer of the $10 billion project, and it is the US space agency that is leading Webb’s public debut, more than six months after the new telescope’s launch.
Events began on Monday afternoon with a ceremonial unveiling of the first image by US President Joe Biden.
Galaxies far and long ago
The debut image of a massive cluster of distant galaxies bending the light of objects in the background was a typical demonstration of Webb’s ability to perceive targets that are more distant and fainter than any telescope has seen before.
The image shows the distant galaxy cluster SMACS J0723.3-7327, a cosmic magnifying glass about five billion light-years away that distorts and magnifies the view of more distant galaxies at the far reaches of the visible universe.
Deep-field composite images of the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 from the Mid-Infrared (left) and Near-Infrared instruments on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. NASA/Reuters
The reveal continued Tuesday morning with four additional releases. In addition to their visual appeal, the five celestial objects selected for Webb’s initial round of observations showcase the telescope’s full range of capabilities, including the contributions of each of its science instruments operating at a different frequency band.
They are all in the infrared part of the spectrum, which the human eye cannot see, but which is ideal for studying objects in the distant universe and nearby phenomena, such as the birth of new stars, which are usually hidden behind curtains of interstellar dust.
The Carina Nebula
A vast star-forming region in our Milky Way galaxy, located 7,500 light-years away.
The “Space Rocks” of the Carina Nebula. The image is divided horizontally by a wavy line between a cloudscape forming a nebula at the bottom and a relatively clear top. Spotted in both parts is a star field that shows countless stars of various sizes. NASA/Reuters
A landscape of mountains and valleys dotted with twinkling stars that is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region called NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. This image reveals for the first time previously unseen regions of star birth by combining information captured by the Near Infrared Camera and the Mid-Infrared Instrument. HANDOUT/AFP/Getty Images
The Southern Ring Nebula
A glowing shell of gas, 2,000 light-years from Earth, that has been ejected from a dying star and etched with a spirograph-like pattern by an orbiting satellite.
The Southern Ring Nebula in near-infrared, left, and mid-infrared, right. In the NIR image, the white dwarf appears in the lower-left corner of the bright central star, partially hidden by a diffraction spike. The same star appears – but brighter, larger and redder – in the mid-infrared instrument’s image. This white dwarf star is covered in thick layers of dust that make it appear larger.NASA/Reuters
Stefan’s Quintet
An iconic group of five galaxies, four of which are in a tangle of complex gravitational interactions, developing at a distance of 290 million light years.
A combination of near- and mid-infrared data shows a cluster of five galaxies that appear close together in the sky: two in the middle, one at the top, one at the upper left, and one at the bottom. NASA/Reuters
The results – greeted with superlatives by the entire astronomy community – indicate that the telescope’s science mission is now underway, with a cascade of data expected to begin rolling out to researchers on Thursday.
“The world’s deepest space exploration vehicle is open for business — all aboard,” Eric Smith, chief scientist for NASA’s Astrophysics Division, said during a briefing Tuesday at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland.
Indeed, so great is the quality and quantity of information evident in Webb’s first images that the milestone carries historical significance as part of a wider saga of scientific development.
It’s been 412 years since Galileo turned a small glass-lensed tube to the night sky and showed that there is more to the heavens—much more—than the eye alone can perceive.
The tabletop fixture has since given way to massive wires of light that reach above rooftops to capture the starry sky. New observatory temples were built in Greenwich, Paris and beyond for professional sky watchers who were no longer concerned with making horoscopes but discerning the great machine of creation.
From the towns to the mountain tops, the telescope was hauled by a team of mules and flatbed trucks. It ranged from the forested slopes of California to the heavenly heights of Hawaii and the Andes.
It then left Earth entirely, rocketing into orbit to become a celestial object in its own right, even as it carried humanity’s gaze billions of light years further into outer space.
Now a new step has been added to the telescope’s remarkable ascent, ushered in by an instrument at Webb that can penetrate to the farthest reaches of the observable universe and answer some of the most fundamental questions ever asked about the cosmos—including how the first stars and galaxies and whether life exists beyond Earth.
The latter question was prompted by the only issue this week that did not include an image.
The spectrum of WASP-96b
This is a spectrum obtained by analyzing the light filtered through the atmosphere of a planet as it crosses in front of the star it orbits. The result confirms the presence of water molecules in the atmosphere.
A light curve from Webb’s Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph shows the change in brightness of the light from the WASP-96 star system over time as the planet transits the star. A transit occurs when an orbiting planet moves between the star and the telescope, blocking some of the light from the star. NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Giveaway
The planet, known as WASP-96 b, is a gas giant roughly half the mass of Jupiter, but far hotter due to its proximity to the star. This makes it a very unlikely place to harbor life, but the same technique can now be applied to a wide range of planets and could possibly find indirect evidence of it, if any.
“We’re going to be looking for ozone, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and all these different signatures that tell us interesting things about what might be producing them on the planet — whether it’s volcanism, a chemical reaction, a geophysical reaction, or maybe a biological reaction,” Natalie said. Ouellet, an astrophysicist at the University of Montreal’s Institute for Exoplanet Research.
A transmission spectrum taken from a single observation using Webb’s Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph reveals the atmospheric characteristics of the hot-gas exoplanet WASP-96 b.NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI
Dr Ouellette added that Webb’s legendary predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope, was launched years before large numbers of planets orbiting other stars in our galaxy were discovered, so it was never optimized for observing them. Webb is a different story, and exoplanets are one area where Canadian researchers are looking to make a mark with it, aided by hardware provided by Canada.
Sarah Gallagher, a professor of astronomy at Western University in London, Ontario, and a science advisor to the Canadian Space Agency, said she was particularly struck by Webb’s perspective on the Stefan quintet she studied.
The galaxies were imaged by two Webb instruments—one showing a view that is relatively similar to what the eye would see, and the other showing what they look like when the dust is removed and shock waves and other structures resulting from the galaxies’ motions are seen. obviously.
“I think it’s so exciting that we can now see unexpected things,” Dr Gallagher said.
Overall, astronomers commented extensively on two of the features of Webb’s images that make them different from those produced by Hubble. The first is the disorienting effect of viewing the universe in infrared light, but with a sharpness and level of detail previously only known in…
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