Astronomers and the public alike are delighting in the glittering depths of the universe revealed by the James Webb Space Telescope
The first images released from the James Webb Space Telescope revealed new views of the cosmos in exquisite, never-before-seen detail. This was thanks in large part to the careful construction of the telescope. There will be a lot to learn from JWST during its mission, from how galaxies evolve to the composition of exoplanet atmospheres.
JWST’s Deepest Field—So Far The first image released from JWST is colloquially referred to as the observatory’s first “deep field,” referring to a technique where astronomers target seemingly barren regions of sky for long telescopic stares to reveal hidden faint objects. Although this picture is described as a deep-field image, this is actually a misnomer, says Becky Smethurst, an astrophysics researcher at the University of Oxford.
Remarkably, the telescope’s optics are so sensitive that diffraction patterns even appear for bright galaxies that are spike-free in Hubble images. “If you zoom in on some of the galaxies, you can actually see that shape very faintly in the center,” Smethurst says. This could be a “very cool identification tool,” she adds, because it could signify a bright, growing supermassive blackhole at the center of such a galaxy.
A Spectral Sniff of Hot Air Collecting high-resolution spectra from celestial bodies also allows JWST to probe distant exoplanets in more detail than ever before. “One of the things that excites me is trying to peer into atmospheres of terrestrial planets,” Mullally says, “We really don’t know what we’re going to find when we look there.” Key questions about exoplanet atmospheres, such as what they’re made of, can be answered using a transmission spectrum such as the one shown here.
At the Edge of the Cosmic Cliffs An image of a stellar nursery in the Carina Nebula about 7,600 light-years away shows massive young stars enrobed in swirling gas and dust. The youngest stars appear as red pinpricks of light in the cloud. This image was taken by JWST’s NIRCam, allowing it to capture previously hidden features within and behind the occluding dust.
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