The first wonderful data from the James Webb Space Telescope

Here they are! The first infrared images and the first spectrum obtained by the James Webb Space Telescope were revealed between yesterday evening and today in several press conferences.

The first image, released yesterday evening directly by the President of the United States of America, is the deepest and sharpest of the distant universe ever seen and portrays the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it appeared 4.6 billion years ago and is overflowing with detail: for the first time we see thousands of galaxies, including very faint objects never observed in the infrared.
One of the most impressive things is that we are observing a portion of the sky the size of a grain of sand held at arm's length from someone on the ground.
But there's more: thanks to the phenomenon of gravitational lensing triggered by the enormous mass of the cluster, the latter acts like a lens giving us the possibility of seeing other galaxies (those that appear most deformed) dating back to about 13 billion years ago, so we are talking about information about the universe shortly after the Big Bang (about a year).

What is gravitational lensing? I refer you to this article by my colleague Crescenzo Tortora to find out!

The second image shows the edge of the young star-forming region NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula, about 7,600 light years away, where thanks to Webb we can finally see young nascent stars in areas that instead they appeared dark in previous observations. The intense ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds from the young stars, which are extremely massive and hot (in the center of the bubble, above the area shown) have hollowed out the cavernous area, eroding the “wall” of the nebula slowly. The “steam” that appears to rise is actually hot, ionized gas mixed with hot dust flowing away from the nebula due to intense ultraviolet radiation.

The star-forming region of NGC 3324 is visible from the southern hemisphere and is located in the northwest corner of the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372), in the constellation Carina.

The third image shows the “Stephan Quintet“, a compact group of galaxies in the constellation Pegasus. Thanks to the James Webb Telescope, scientists can now take a look in unprecedented detail at how interacting galaxies are triggering star formation in each other and how the gas present is being disturbed.

The latest image is that of the Southern Ring planetary nebula, an expanding cloud of gas surrounding a dying star, about 2,000 light-years away. For the first time it is possible to observe, behind the star in the center of the image, the dying star (the dimmer one in the right image) and responsible for the emissions of gas and dust, thanks to the presence of two chambers in different lengths wave (near and mid-infrared) on board Webb.

Webb può dunque esplorare i gusci di espulsione di polvere e gas di stelle che stanno invecchiando, che un giorno potrebbero diventare nuovamente una stella o pianeta.

Additionally, the James Webb Telescope observed the exoplanet WASP-96b in detail by studying its spectrum, clearly revealing the presence of water in the atmosphere, along with evidence of mist and clouds never achieved before.

Press release NASA
Press release ESA

Images Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA e STScI