Tag: webb
Scientists harness powers of Webb and Hubble in stunning galactic image
Stare into the core of the Phantom Galaxy.
New images from humanity’s most powerful space telescopes — the legendary Hubble telescope and its successor the James Webb Space Telescope — reveal unprecedented detail in this magnificent distant spiral galaxy. It’s 32 million light-years away.
The over 30-year-old Hubble telescope views light we can see (visible light), while the Webb telescope views a type of light with longer wavelengths (called “infrared light”) that isn’t visible to us. Together, these instruments gather bounties of data that reveal new insights about what lies in the distant cosmos.
The middle image below shows the combined views of the Hubble and Webb telescopes. What you can see:
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The areas of bright pink in the reddish spirals are active star-forming regions
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The bright blue dots are other stars
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The core of the galaxy glows cyan and green. These are older stars clustered around the galactic center.
Credit: ESA / Webb / NASA / CSA / J. Lee and the PHANGS-JWST Team / Acknowledgement: J. Schmidt
In the Webb image by itself (the top image of this story or the right-side image in the comparison above), it’s easy to see the many stars (shown in blue) amassed in the galaxy’s core. A lack of gas at the heart of the Phantom Galaxy makes this view exceptionally clear.
Hubble continues to capture dazzling views of distant stars and galaxies. Meanwhile, Webb, stationed 1 million miles away from Earth, is expected to reveal new insights about the universe. Here’s how Webb will achieve unparalleled things:
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Giant mirror: Webb’s mirror, which captures light, is over 21 feet across. That’s over two and a half times larger than the Hubble Space Telescope’s mirror. Capturing more light allows Webb to see more distant, ancient objects. The telescope will peer at stars and galaxies that formed over 13 billion years ago, just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang.
“We’re going to see the very first stars and galaxies that ever formed,” Jean Creighton, an astronomer and the director of the Manfred Olson Planetarium at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, told Mashable last year.
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Infrared view: Webb is primarily an infrared telescope, meaning it views light in the infrared spectrum. This allows us to see far more of the universe. Infrared has longer wavelengths than visible light, so the light waves more efficiently slip through cosmic clouds; the light doesn’t as often collide with and get scattered by these densely-packed particles. Ultimately, Webb’s infrared eyesight can penetrate places Hubble can’t.
“It lifts the veil,” said Creighton.
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Peering into distant exoplanets: The Webb telescope carries specialized equipment, called spectrometers, that will revolutionize our understanding of these far-off worlds. The instruments can decipher what molecules (such as water, carbon dioxide, and methane) exist in the atmospheres of distant exoplanets — be they gas giants or smaller rocky worlds. Webb will look at exoplanets in the Milky Way galaxy. Who knows what we’ll find?
“We might learn things we never thought about,” Mercedes López-Morales, an exoplanet researcher and astrophysicist at the Center for Astrophysics-Harvard & Smithsonian, told Mashable in 2021.
Webb and Hubble telescopes join forces to capture multi-spectrum image of Phantom Galaxy
The JWST has dazzled since it began sending images back to Earth, but sometimes even the most advanced space telescope ever needs a little help from a friend. On Monday, the European Space Agency released a new image of the Phantom Galaxy. Located approximately 32 million light years away from Earth, Messier 74 has been a favorite of astronomers ever since it was discovered in 1780 by Pierre Méchain.
What makes the above image of the Phantom Galaxy different from the ones you might have seen in the past is that it’s a composite. It incorporates visible and ultraviolet wavelengths captured by the Hubble Space Telescope with infrared light seen by James Webb Space Telescope. You can see the separate images the two captured below. Webb’s snap of M74 highlights all the gas and dust at the outer edge of the “grand design spiral” galaxy. The image also shows off the nuclear star cluster at its center.
Moreso than being a pretty image, this new view of the Phantom Galaxy is a testament to how much the Hubble Space Telescope has yet to give to the science community. The European Space Agency says Hubble’s observations of M74 revealed star formations known as “HII” regions within the galaxy. You have to admit, that’s pretty good for a telescope that was only expected to stay operational for 15 years but has been going strong for 32 years. “By combining data from telescopes operating across the electromagnetic spectrum, scientists can gain greater insight into astronomical objects than by using a single observatory – even one as powerful as Webb,” the ESA said.
James Webb Space Telescope detects carbon dioxide in a distant planet’s atmosphere
The James Webb Space Telescope can do much more than produce astonishingimages of the universe. The observatory has, for the first time, found clear evidence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of a planet that’s not in our solar system. It detected the gas on WASP-39 b, a gas giant that’s orbiting a star some 700 light years away.
The Hubble and Spitzer telescopes previously detected water vapor, sodium and potassium in the planet’s atmosphere. But JWST has more powerful and sensitive infrared capabilities and was able to pick up the signature of carbon dioxide as well.
Catch your breath — Webb has captured the first clear evidence of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere of a planet outside of our solar system! WASP-39 B is a gas giant closely orbiting a Sun-like star 700 light years away: https://t.co/FenLqV6HSopic.twitter.com/abJvqxfLdG
— NASA Webb Telescope (@NASAWebb) August 25, 2022
“Understanding the composition of a planet’s atmosphere can help us learn more about its origin and evolution,” an official JWST Twitter account notes. “Webb’s success here offers evidence that it could also be able to detect and measure carbon dioxide in the thinner atmospheres of smaller rocky planets in the future.”
NASA previously released spectroscopic data JWST captured from WASP-96 b, a gas exoplanet that’s approximately 1,150 light years away. The observatory detected “the unambiguous signature of water,” along with haze and clouds, which were not previously believed to exist on WASP-96 b.
Also this week, researchers announced the discovery of an exoplanet that’s around 100 light years away. It was detected with the help of NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and ground-based telescopes rather than JWST, but it might merit a closer look from the latter. Researchers believe that water could make up as much as 30 percent of the mass of TOI-1452 b, which has been deemed a “super-Earth.” It’s around 70 percent larger than Earth and it may have a “very deep ocean.”
New James Webb image lets us see Jupiter for the trippy place it is
In a pair of eye-opening new space photos, the largest planet in our solar system glows like never before, with its hazy surface, and its northern and southern auroras, rendered seemingly incandescent by the sun’s glaring rays.
The James Webb Space Telescope is equipped with a system called the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), which doesn’t take photos like your smartphone does. By taking in light from outside the spectrum visible to the human eye, it captures previously invisible realities — presenting Jupiter as a planet teeming with ethereal phenomena.
The new infrared view
Credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Jupiter ERS Team / Image processing by Judy Schmidt.
A 2020 Hubble photo of Jupiter
Credit: NASA / ESA / STScI / A. Simon (Goddard Space Flight Center) / M.H. Wong (University of California, Berkeley) / OPAL team
To convert the infrared data into useable, and gorgeous, images, NASA received help from citizen scientist Judy Schmidt who pieced together the above photo from three infrared data layers. In the above image, the red layer comes from Webb’s F360M layer, which is used for planets; the yellow-green layer is Webb’s F212N filter, used for molecular hydrogen; and the cyan comes from the F150W2 filter (you can read more about these filters here). Schmidt also corrected the misalignment of the images caused by Jupiter’s rotation.
A second image by NASA, Schmidt, and citizen scientist Ricardo Hueso is drawn from just two of the NIRCam filters, and it gives a wider view of this glowing, infrared version of Jupiter. We see the enormous planet set against distant galaxies, and can make out its faint and rarely photographed rings, along with two of its moons: Amalthea and Adrastea.
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Credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Jupiter ERS Team / Image processing by Ricardo Hueso (UPV / EHU) and Judy Schmidt
Astronomer Imke de Pater, who along with astronomer Thierry Fouchet led the Webb Jupiter observations, told NASA: “We hadn’t really expected it to be this good, to be honest,” and added, “It’s really remarkable that we can see details on Jupiter together with its rings, tiny satellites, and even galaxies in one image.”
James Webb Space Telescope shows stunning shots of Jupiter
It’s ‘remarkable that we can see details on Jupiter together with its rings, tiny satellites, and even galaxies in one image,’ said a lead astronomer.
Read more: James Webb Space Telescope shows stunning shots of Jupiter
The universe shines bright in these stunning James Webb images
The first images captured by the James Webb Space Telescope have shined a light on how stars form, galaxies merge and the early days of the universe.
Read more: The universe shines bright in these stunning James Webb images
Breathtaking James Webb video zooms through the cosmos to the Cartwheel Galaxy
Tumble into the Cartwheel Galaxy.
The Cartwheel Galaxy is the latest distant galaxy to get the Webb telescope treatment. The Webb telescope is the most powerful telescope ever built, and it continues to capture incredible images of the distant cosmos. In a new video from the European Space Agency, which partners with NASA and the Canadian Space Agency, the telescope zooms through the cosmos to the Cartwheel Galaxy located 500 million light-years away.
The video ends with a stunning composite image of the Cartwheel Galaxy captured by Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera and Mid-Infrared Instrument the combination of which allows for a level of detail and clarity that would be hard to see in the individual images.
In the snapshot, the Cartwheel Galaxy is in a transitory stage, meaning it might be in the process of colliding or interacting with another galaxy. The future form the galaxy will take is still a mystery, but the images provide insight into its past and future.