James Webb Space Telescope

Thanks to the telescope's deep and sharp infrared images, Earthlings are getting a more detailed look at distant galaxies than was ever possible.

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NASA revealed the first scientific images from the James Webb Space Telescope. The cosmic photos feature fresh looks at galaxies in the deep universe, ...

“We humans really are connected to the Universe. We’re made of the same stuff in this beautiful landscape.” Hundreds of new stars can be seen in this image that scientists hadn’t seen yet, as well as even more violent jets and bubbles caused by baby stars tearing away at the nearby gas and dust. This picture shows the cosmic cliffs of the nebula in stunning detail and color, revealing more detail about this area than ever before. “The gravity of the cluster is distorting and warping our view of what’s behind,” Jane Rigby, operations project scientist for JWST at NASA, said during the briefing. JWST was able to capture the spectrum — or the breakdown of light — filtered through the atmosphere of a planet outside of our Solar System, or an exoplanet. It’s so luminous, in fact, that the resulting glow is 40 billion times as bright as that of our Sun. They’re so massive that they warp space and time around them, creating a lensing effect that magnifies the galaxies in the background. By stripping away that light, we see a surprise shining bright in the center of the top galaxy. in the atmosphere of this specific exoplanet,” Knicole Colon, an astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, said during a briefing today on the spectrum. Today’s images each showcase an exciting ability of the observatory — and they’re only a jumping-off point of what’s to come. NASA hailed the image as the deepest infrared image of the Universe ever taken. Yesterday, NASA announced that it had officially finished calibrating JWST’s various instruments and testing out all of its different operating modes, meaning the observatory and its tools have all been deemed ready to start collecting data.

It was actually launched by ESA, on an Ariane 5 rocket, from French Guiana, and operates mainly in the infrared range of the electromagnetic spectrum. It thus ...

The telescope, named after James Webb, Nasa administrator from 1961 to 1968, was launched on Christmas Day last year. It thus complements other, already operating, space telescopes which operate in the visible, ultraviolet and X-ray ranges, such as the Hubble and Chandra instruments. The image includes galaxies that are 13.2-billion light years away, or, in other words, galaxies that existed only 600-million years after the Big Bang, which created our Universe.

Among the newly released images are breathtaking views of a distant galaxy group called Stephan's Quintet that was discovered in 1877.

Researchers have said that Webb could unlock mysteries from as far back as 100 million years after the Big Bang — observations that could help astronomers understand how the modern universe came to be. As such, the telescope is expected to provide first-of-its-kind infrared views of the universe, and capture some never-before-seen cosmic objects. Scientists have said the observatory, which will be able to see deeper into space and in greater detail than any telescope that has come before it, could revolutionize human understanding of the universe.

The dawn of a new era in astronomy has begun as the world gets its first look at the full capabilities of the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. The ...

Looking at this star-forming region in the southern constellation Carina, as well as others like it, Webb can see newly forming stars and study the gas and dust that made them.Read more about this image In return for these contributions, European scientists will get a minimum share of 15% of the total observing time, like for the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Now, scientists can get a rare look, in unprecedented detail, at how interacting galaxies are triggering star formation in each other and how the gas in these galaxies is being disturbed.Read more about this image From birth to death as a planetary nebula, Webb can explore the expelling shells of dust and gas of aging stars that may one day become a new star or planet.Read more about this image With Webb’s first detection of water in the atmosphere of an exoplanet, it will now set out to study hundreds of other systems to understand what other planetary atmospheres are made of.Read more about this image - SMACS 0723: Webb has delivered the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant Universe so far – and in only 12.5 hours.

A "stellar nursery" and a "cosmic dance" are among James Webb's first batch of colour images.

Astronomers refer here to a "cosmic reef", or "cosmic cliff" - a kind of broad demarcation between dust in the bottom half, and then gas in the top half. But this treasure trove comes from only a few days of observations, and so far the telescope's only looked at a minute fraction of the sky. Key partners on the Webb project are the European and Canadian space agencies. And this was the great hope - that we would have Webb working alongside Hubble. They have different strengths and being able to compare and contrast will give scientists a new dimension to their studies. These first images from the James Webb Space Telescope are jaw-dropping. But the officials at Nasa who are in charge of the old warhorse have just submitted a five-year budget plan. Except in this Webb image, we not only see the stars - our eyes are drawn to all that gas and the dust. The Southern Ring, or "Eight-Burst" nebula, is a giant expanding sphere of gas and dust that's been lit up by a dying star in the centre. This Webb image doesn't look that different from the Hubble version at first glance, but the new telescope's infrared sensitivity will pull out different features for astronomers to study. Four of the five galaxies within the quintet are locked in a cosmic dance of repeated close encounters. Everywhere you see a red arc-like structure - that's something - a galaxy - way off in the distance and far further back in time. It's known to astronomers as a "gravitational lens" because the mass of the cluster bends and magnifies the light of objects that are much further away.

Scientists 'thrilled and relieved' to get first images from most powerful space-based observatory ever built.

Since it blasted off in December, scientists have endured a nailbiting six months as the observatory has unfolded, deployed a sunshield the size of a tennis court, and aligned its 18 gold-plated mirrors en route to its destination 1m miles from Earth. This revealed the presence of water vapour, though the planet is too hot to harbour liquid water. It’s more than capable of doing that kind of science, superbly well.” “We’re seeing these galaxies in detail we’ve never been able to see before,” said Dr Jane Rigby, an operations project scientist on Webb. The “deep field” image released on Monday showcased Webb’s ability to harness the gravitational forces of galaxy clusters to magnify far more distant galaxies behind them. “I am so thrilled and so relieved,” said Dr John Mather, Nasa’s senior project scientist on the mission.

NASA revealed the first science-quality images from the James Webb Space Telescope on July 12, 2022, marking the beginning of the observatory's tenure.

Regardless of what it is called, the telescope is set to make history. Leading up to the release of the first images, some astronomers have expressed mixed emotions on Twitter, as excitement for the new data and dislike of the name mingle. Over the years, Webb was sometimes severely strapped for funding, and at least once was in danger of being canceled due to soaring costs. "This is just one sliver of data that Webb is providing us, using the NIRISS instrument specifically." Startling new insights could start to stream in quickly as research begins on every conceivable scale in our universe, from our solar system to the very first galaxies. "You get a bunch of what looks like bumps and wiggles to some people, but it's actually full of information," Colón said. Stephan's Quintet is a group of five galaxies that appear preposterously close together, about 290 million light-years away from Earth. Four of the galaxies are locked in a sort of cosmic dance that will one day result in the quartet colliding, and three sport elongated, spiral-like shapes from their interactions. The gas giant world, about half the size of Jupiter, is the closest of the newly revealed objects, at about 1,150 light-years away. Together, the images and data represent the huge potential of the telescope to contribute to scientific research, and signal Webb's transition into an active scientific instrument. The Carina Nebula, one of the brightest and largest nebulas in the sky, is 7,600 light-years away from Earth. Spanning over 300 light-years across, it includes Eta Carinae, a dying supergiant star on the brink of a massive explosion, as well as Trumper 14, one of the youngest known clusters of star formation. The only known cloudless planet, WASP-96 b has been an enigma and a prime target for further study since its discovery in 2013. "This stunning vista of the cosmic cliff of the Carina Nebula reveals new details about this vast stellar nursery.

“Wow. Wow. This. This near infrared image is … wow,” Alex Lockwood, a James Webb Space Telescope project scientist, managed to utter as she and astronomer Karl ...

According to NASA, the image shows for the first time “previously invisible areas of star birth.” “We humans really are connected to the universe.” Stephan’s Quintet is a group of five galaxies whose gravitational forces have locked four of them in a “cosmic dance,” said Giovanna Giardino, an astronomer with the European Space Agency. Two are in the process of merging into a single galaxy, she added. “We knew this was a binary star, but we didn’t really see much of the actual star that produced the nebula,” Gordon said. Instead, it represents the final life stages of a dying star that’s “expelled a large fraction of its mass in successive waves,” said Karl Gordon, mid-infrared astronomer and Webb instrument scientist. But we also know we’re going to find things we never even imagined and it’s just going to open up a whole new world of astrophysics.”

The first photos from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have been released. Here's everything you need to know about space's hottest new photographer.

The Webb telescope cost $10 billion. NASA's website describes Webb as the government official who did more for science than perhaps any other and a fitting recipient to be the namesake of the Next Generation Space Telescope. The James Webb telescope is designed to capture light 100 times fainter than that captured by Hubble. As for the planets in our own solar system – the Webb telescope can see those too, of course. The telescope looks back in time using gravitational lensing. They are seen in part because the James Webb Telescope targeted a cluster called SMACS 0723, which has a gravitational field so strong it magnifies the light of older, more distant galaxies.

NASA says its extended inquiry into what Webb's role might've been in homophobic government policies is complete, an update is coming, and the name stays.

"Memorialization is important because it expresses a nation's values," Szkody said in the follow-up letter. American Astronomical Society President Paula Szkody sent a letter to Nelson in November requesting a public and formal report on the investigation and calling for a more inclusive naming process. "On the specific allegations against Webb the evidence is clear," Oluseyi concluded. "The records clearly show that Webb planned and participated in meetings during which he handed over homophobic material," the column reads. In May 2021, four astronomers circulated a petition that gathered more than 1,700 signatures from scientists and others calling for the telescope to be renamed. James Webb was NASA administrator, the agency's highest-ranking official, from 1961 until 1968, shepherding the agency through a golden era, including much of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs.

Images of five targets showcase the most distant objects ever observed in outer space.

In the mid-infrared image on the right, we can see the white dwarf more clearly, surrounded by dust, a view made possible because of the power of JWST’s instruments. The gravitational interactions pull broad trails of gas and dust away from the galaxies, and Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows huge shockwaves as one of the galaxies, NGC 7318 B, slams through the cluster. This massive landscape of cosmic mountains and valleys in the Carina Nebula is known as the “Cosmic Cliffs.” Here the bubbles, cavities, and jets of newborn stars are made visible through the dust in a way that was impossible when the Hubble Space Telescope imaged this region of intense star formation. This pair of images of the Southern Ring Nebula shows two powerful perspectives on the same binary star system, a white dwarf and its younger counterpart. The youngest stars appear as red dots in the darker areas of the dust cloud; others are emitting ‘protostellar’ jets typical of early star birth. The space telescope, a project 30 years in the making, launched in December 2021 and arrived at its destination point in January. After a lengthy “unfolding” process, JWST turned its 21-foot mirror on the stars.

Much-anticipated images from Hubble's successor show, in brilliant and startling detail, far corners of the unseen universe.

We're going to answer so many questions and then, of course, we're going to have more questions that we never dreamed of. "From a scientific perspective, there is something about humanity that just really wants to know about where we are and to where we came from," LaMassa says. Just being involved in seeing all these different subsystems that need to work together—having 18 different individual mirror segments working as one—for all the instruments getting initial data and starting to process it and getting things working to the point where we could take these amazing images," she says. The space telescope, Hubble's successor, will be able to see back in time, capturing images such as the first galaxies that formed after the big bang, and will offer much-more-detailed views of nebulas and star systems in the distant universe. "And so, we're really seeing for the first time what galaxies looked like in the early universe." But an endeavor doesn't get any more cosmic than that of the $9.7 billion James Webb Space Telescope, which in December launched on a journey 1 million miles from Earth and today released its first batch of images from space.

The first set of science images from the James Webb Space Telescope revealed marvellous stars and galaxies. Space reporter Leah Crane answers all your ...

What’s special about WASP-96b is that it isn’t cloudy – the new spectrum shows some evidence of clouds and haze, but not much. The images are all of systems that are already very well studied, but we just have far more detail now than ever before. I’ve seen 13.5 billion light years quoted – that seems very close to the age of the universe at about 13.8 billion years. In fact, the picture of Stephan’s Quintet that was just released is providing some interesting information on one already. JWST should be able to see between 100 and 250 million years after the big bang! On 12 July, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) released its first set of full-resolution science images.

NASA released five new images from the James Webb Space Telescope, revealing incredible details of ancient galaxies, stars and the presence of water in the ...

Webb is also excellently suited to study the end of a star’s life. The large white galaxies in the middle of the image belong to the cluster and are similar in age to the Sun and Earth. Surrounding and interspersed among the cluster galaxies are more distant galaxies, but stretched into spectacular arcs as if seen through a magnifying glass. During this transit, a portion of the star’s light was filtered through the planet’s atmosphere and left a “chemical fingerprint” in the light’s unique spectrum. It is like the universe in high definition, and I encourage you to look at the full resolution image and zoom in to truly appreciate the details. Webb was designed to collect light across the entire red to mid-infrared spectrum – wavelengths of light that are blocked by Earth’s atmosphere. In them are the oldest galaxies ever seen by human eyes, evidence of water on a planet 1,000 light-years away and incredible details showing the birth and death of stars.

NASA unveiled full-color images from the $11 billion James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) on Tuesday, marking the first of what is sure to be many releases ...

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“Cosmic Cliffs” in the Carina Nebula (NIRCam Image). What looks much like craggy mountains on a moonlit evening is actually the edge of a nearby, young, ...

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Through direct comparison with images from Hubble, you can start to see the exquisite detail and clarity Webb provides.

And the mid-infrared reveals light from a supermassive black hole in the centre of the top galaxy. The detail of the dust distribution and the tug-of-war taking place between the galaxies leaps out from the image. What also stands out is the vast sea of distant galaxies in the background. And that’s just the beginning. The mid-infared also highlights the dust being formed in the expanding gas. The five galaxies are in close proximity. Located some 1120 light-years away, this planet weighs in at about half the mass of Jupiter. This happens at a speed of about 15 kilometres per second, sending out rings of gas and dust. You’ll immediately notice the many elongates arcs, representing background galaxies which have been “gravitationally lensed” as a result of the cluster’s mass. Today we saw the release of the first batch of images taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. This is something we have both been waiting on for nearly 25 years. It seems the bar has been raised once again, and Webb is set to herald a new age for astronomy and space research. Now, with the long-awaited first images in our hands, let’s take a look at what they show.

Pics Each colored speck or oval-shaped orb dotting the background in each image collected by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and released on Tuesday, ...

"I have no doubt that we're going to see spectacular things from the Solar System soon," said Klaus Pontoppidan, a project scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute. Rigby said the probe could measure the light from Cepheid stars, red giants, and galaxies to calculate their accurate distances away from Earth, allowing researchers to estimate Hubble's constant – a hotly contested measure of how fast the universe is expanding. "From the data that I've seen so far, from the work that we've seen … the first week of science is going to be revolutionary. Finally, the fourth image released on Tuesday is actually a graph detailing the light spectrum of WASP-96b, an exoplanet 1,150 light years away. Here's a link to the same picture snapped by the Hubble Space Telescope for comparison. The highest points of the cavity stretch about seven light years from top to bottom in the image.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has revealed details of the Southern Ring planetary nebula that were previously hidden from astronomers.

'Ultimate Space Telescope' explores the teamwork it took to get Webb into space and ready for science.

A follow-up documentary about Webb's early discoveries will premiere on NOVA in 2023, PBS added. In 2017, Hurricane Harvey devastated the city of Houston, severely impairing the scientists' access to power and electricity just as they were putting the telescope through a crucial set of tests — yet, they were able to persevere." Since Webb is optimized to study objects in infrared light, it will shed new information on these galaxies. "As astronomers scoured the Hubble deep field, they noticed strange, red amorphous galaxies," PBS said of one of the set of multi-day images. "Originally scheduled to launch in 2007, [Webb] was met with a number of delays," PBS stated. — James Webb Space Telescope: The engineering behind a 'first light machine' that is not allowed to fail

Two fascinating pictures of the gas giant Jupiter were leaked alongside the main images from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) released yesterday. The ...

The composite shows a short-wavelength image of Jupiter on the left, and a long-wavelength image on the right, revealing the kinds of dramatically different atmospheric conditions that the JWST is able to spot. The second image was an analysis of the atmosphere of a giant planet called WASP-96b, and is the first "spectrum analysis" of an exoplanet's atmosphere. The composite shows a short-wavelength image of Jupiter on the left, and a long-wavelength image on the right, revealing the kinds of dramatically different atmospheric conditions that the JWST is able to spot.

Lurking in a commissioning report lies our solar system's mightiest planet.

The commissioning document states that JWST's ability to track fast moving objects is actually better than expected (this telescope just keeps winning) and that opens up the possibility it will be able to study things like near-Earth asteroids! The document is available from the Space Telescope Science Institute but we've got the images just below. Maybe it doesn't stack up with the bounty of images released over the past 48 hours — that's some tough competition — but it's still pretty gnarly.

On top of the first high-resolution science images that NASA's James Webb Space Telescope team has just released, there was also a picture of Jupiter hidden ...

Taking pictures of Jupiter was part of a test to make sure that the observatory could track objects moving at high speeds through the solar system. Amid a flurry of highly anticipated new images from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the observatory team also released its first images of Jupiter. The pictures, shown above, were taken while JWST’s scientific instruments were being tested and show the planet as well as its ring and three of its moons. The pictures were taken using the telescope’s near infrared camera, NIRCam, using two different filters to focus on separate wavelengths of light.

NASA released two brand new photos of Jupiter taken by an imaging tool onboard the James Webb Space Telescope yesterday. They show the gas giant's moons, ...

Among them is an image revealing baby stars in the Carina Nebula (pictured), where ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds shape colossal walls of dust and gas Cameras aboard Webb captured the latest image of this planetary nebula, catalogued as NGC 3132, and known informally as the Southern Ring Nebula. It is approximately 2,500 light-years away. It was taken using the F212N filter that highlights light of wavelength 2.12 micrometres One image is of Stephan's Quintet, which is located in the constellation Pegasus and is notable for being the first compact galaxy group ever discovered in 1877 Another image is of Stephan's Quintet, which is located in the constellation Pegasus and is notable for being the first compact galaxy group ever discovered in 1877. Pictured is the first image from the James Webb Space Telescope, showing SMACS 0723, a galaxy cluster billions of light-years from Earth One image was taken in the near-infrared (left) and another in the mid-infrared (right) NIRCam (Near InfraRed Camera) an infrared imager from the edge of the visible through the near infrared NIRCam short-wavelength image of Jupiter taken by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, showing the moons Thebe, Europa and Metis. It was taken using the F323N filter that highlights light of wavelength 3.23 micrometre NIRCam short-wavelength image of Jupiter taken by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, showing the moons Thebe, Europa and Metis and the Great Red Spot on the planet's surface. The glowing snaps of the gas giant - the closest one to Earth in our Solar System - were taken by the telescope when it was being tested. Space enthusiasts across the world were starstruck by the first set of full-colour photos taken by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) released yesterday.

NASA revealed images taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. · The instrument was launched on 25 December 2021. · Its cost was $9 billion.

Apart from the imagery, NASA presented Webb's first spectrographic analysis of a Jupiter-sized exoplanet more than 1 100 light years away - revealing the molecular signatures of filtered light passing through its atmosphere, including the presence of water vapor. Underscoring the vastness of the universe, the thousands of galaxies appearing in the SMACS 0723 image appear in a tiny patch of sky roughly the size of a sand grain held at arm's length by someone standing on Earth. The bejewelled-like photo, according to NASA, offers the "most detailed view of the early universe" as well as the "deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant cosmos" yet taken. One of the older galaxies appearing in the "background" of the photo - a composite of images of different wavelengths of light - dates back about 13.1 billion years. Its infrared optics allow Webb to detect a wider range of celestial objects and see through clouds of dust and gas that obscure light in the visible spectrum. The first full-colour, high-resolution pictures from the James Webb Space Telescope, designed to peer farther than before with greater clarity to the dawn of the universe, were hailed by NASA as milestone marking a new era of astronomical exploration.

How did the universe begin? Is there life on planets in other solar systems? These questions may soon have answers.

What to do when your car starts giving you problems Read More Read More Read More Read More The James Webb Space Telescope is wondrous.