The James Webb Space Telescope’s image of NGC-604 with its Near-Infrared Camera. (Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI)
Since December 2021, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has unlocked various secrets of our universe. From providing newer images of galaxies taken by the Hubble Space Telescope to enlightening experts on supernova remnants and peering into the early universe, the spacecraft has already discovered so much.
Below are the latest and greatest images that NASA has released from the JWST.
March 9, 2024: Nebula NGC-604’s Technicolor Clouds
The James Webb Space Telescope’s image of NGC-604 with its Near-Infrared Camera. (Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI)
The JWST has captured another kaleidoscope of colors in its latest image of NGC-604, on March 9. The nebula, or star-forming cloud, is 2.73 million light years away from Earth in the Triangulum galaxy.
JWST captured the nebula’s gas and dust, which was sculpted with stellar wind from newly formed stars with its NIRCam and MIRI Cam. The image’s orange streaks in the carved-out areas are from the nebula’s carbon or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The areas with a deep red shade are from hydrogen. Cool hydrogen gas is what fuels star formation. The areas that appear bright white are ionized hydrogen.
The bubbles within the nebula are filled with over 200 types of stars, all within different stages of their lives. Some are over 100 times bigger than our Sun, with short lifespans.
This nebula is interesting because it features these stars. Very few nebulas, such as this one, are found near Earth (compared to other nebulas that are billions of light years away, NGC-604’s nearly three million light-year distance is in our backyard). The nebula’s proximity allows researchers to study stars early on in their lives.
JWST’s MIRICam image. (Credit:NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI)
The galaxy is less vibrant in another JWST image of the nebula taken with the space telescope’s MIRICam. This is because these stars emit less light when seen at mid-infrared wavelengths compared to NIRCam’s near-infrared capabilities.
Article Sources
Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article: