The James Webb Space Telescope

Join the discussion
Ask a follow-up here, or get your own question answered by working scientists, mathematicians and engineers — people, not an autocomplete.
Real named experts · corrections over time · the nuance an AI answer skips
545 replies · 66K views
Black spots can represent an image where the detector is saturated at that point. It does not say in the link.

1683895307560.png
 
Reply
  • Like
  • Informative
Likes   Reactions: russ_watters, DennisN and berkeman
Astronomy news on Phys.org
This is a nice one Pandora's cluster. Bottom right quarter looks like lensing.

1683895983584.png
 
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: DennisN
Reply
  • Haha
Likes   Reactions: DennisN
This yesterday. Barred spiral Galaxy.

1686142860438.png
 
Reply
  • Like
  • Love
Likes   Reactions: Structure seeker, collinsmark, DennisN and 1 other person
Bandersnatch said:
Breaking news: Scientists find HeII in a galaxy at the edge of the universe!

Somebody hire me as a headline writer. I'll get you all the clicks.
" The very high EW(HeII) suggests that the putative PopIII
stars must have a top-heavy IMF reaching an upper mass
cutoff of at least 500 M⊙."

Anything over this presumably all hell would break loose?
 
Reply
  • Haha
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Astranut, DennisN and BillTre
@Borg from #386

Looks like dust afterall!

1688992177417.png
 
@Astranut drew my attention to this on X.
chrome_screenshot_1690388416404.png
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Reply
  • Like
  • Love
Likes   Reactions: DennisN, BillTre, collinsmark and 2 others
pinball1970 said:
https://webb.nasa.gov/content/webbL...31-23-STScI-01GZY2VJ33V4R0B7QKFEEQ72E1-1k.jpg

If you click on the link and get on image on the NASA site, you can zoom in closer (and closer and closer...)

Some descriptions what is going on with the lensing, dust, distances.


View attachment 330099
Here's a link to the NASA site with the expandable image:


[Edit: Actually, I see now it's not NASA's site directly, but is NASA's Flikr site. PF won't let me display the link text; it automatically embeds the media. Go ahead and click on it though to be taken to NASA's Flikr area.]
 
Last edited:
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Astranut, pinball1970 and DennisN
mfb said:
There is a big question mark here. A galaxy-sized question mark, in fact, in the bottom center of the image.

View attachment 330193

Full picture at ESAWebb
Nice find! :biggrin:

I'm guessing it's some nebulosity within our own Milky Way Galaxy though. A new question mark shape, not to be confused with NGC 7822 (a different question mark).
 
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: pinball1970 and DennisN
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2023/webb-reveals-new-structures-within-iconic-supernova

When I saw this image initially, I thought it looked blurred compared to the recent ring nebula images.

1693915438030.png
However, with a quick check, the Ring Nebula is located a lot closer 2,567 ly and 1.3 ly across, whereas this supernova (SN 1987A) is 168,000 ly distant and 0.6 ly across.

Plus, there is a nice history with this image. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SN_1987A

Neutrinos were observed on earth detectors few hours prior to the super nova according to the article.

Also within that link Hubble took images between 1994 and 2008 showing how it changed over time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SN_19...7a_debris_evolution_animation_time_scaled.gif
 
Last edited:
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: Astranut, collinsmark, vanhees71 and 1 other person
A brand new video from the Royal Institution...
I haven't seen it myself yet, but I will.
I'm pretty sure it's good. 🙂

What has the James Webb Space Telescope discovered in its first year? – with Naomi Rowe-Gurney (14 September, 2023)


And there's also a Q&A here.
 
Reply
  • Like
  • Informative
Likes   Reactions: Astranut, pinball1970 and Tom.G
Webb with Chandra C.O. @Astranut (you can post these too fella!)
The detail is pretty stunning, an x-ray/IR combo.
UHZ1 Distant Galaxy and black hole.

Screenshot_2023-11-11-11-47-40-189~2.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: DennisN, Astranut and berkeman
Reply
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: collinsmark, DennisN and Filip Larsen
This thread is two years old tomorrow!

Anyway, Cassiopeia A image by Webb.

Link with all the images here.

https://www.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-stuns-with-new-high-definition-look-at-exploded-star/

From the link.

“Embedded in this gas is a mixture of dust and molecules, which will eventually become components of new stars and planetary systems.
Some filaments of debris are too tiny to be resolved by even Webb, meaning they are comparable to or less than 10 billion miles across (around 100 astronomical units).
In comparison, the entirety of Cas A spans 10 light-years across, or 60 trillion miles.”

I had to read that twice to make sure I had not missed something, so if it is 10 billion miles across it is too small to be picked up by Webb. Given the exquisite detail it is easy to take for granted how enormous these structures are.

The article has a side by side with MIRI, below is a side by side with Hubble, see the difference in resolution/detail.

JWST 2023 HST 2016

1702474342234.png
 
Last edited:
Reply
  • Like
  • Love
Likes   Reactions: collinsmark, BillTre, Astranut and 3 others
It is on the NASA front page image today.

1703164503184.png
 
Reply
  • Love
  • Like
Likes   Reactions: BillTre and DennisN