The Webb "will examine every phase of cosmic history: from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang to the formation of galaxies, stars, and planets to the evolution of our own solar system.". It is, says NASA, the "scientific successor" to the Hubble Space Telescope: "Hubble's science pushed us to look to longer wavelengths to It means about 100 million years earlier than anything previously identified. The previous oldest galaxy, known as GN-Z11, was spotted by the Hubble Space Telescope. As quoted by AFP, Naidu said, "We're potentially looking at the most distant starlight that anyone has ever seen." "We found two very compelling candidates for extremely distant James Webb Space Telescope was launched in December 2021 after multiple delays and cost overruns. It now circles the Earth at an orbit of 1.6 million kilometres, allowing it to achieve the US President Joe Biden on 11 July 2022 released the debut photo from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope - an image of a galaxy cluster revealing the most detailed glimpse of the early universe ever As a "first light" bonus, a camera on the NIRCam took a picture of the mirror array itself — the closest look at the spacecraft that anyone has gotten since shortly after it left Earth. The first Vay Tiền Trả Góp 24 Tháng. Editor’s Note Sign up for CNN’s Wonder Theory science Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. CNN — Astronomers have detected the most distant known organic molecules in the universe using the James Webb Space Telescope. It’s the first time Webb has detected complex molecules in the distant universe. The complex molecules were found in a galaxy known as SPT0418-47, located more than 12 billion light-years away. The discovery sheds light on the chemical interactions that occurred within the earliest galaxies in the universe and how they relate to star formation. On Earth, the molecules, called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, can be found in smoke, soot, smog, engine exhaust and forest fires. The base of the organic molecules is carbon, considered to be one of the building blocks of life because it’s a key element in amino acids, which form proteins. A study detailing the findings was published Monday in the journal Nature. The light from the dusty galaxy began traveling across the cosmos when the universe was less than billion years old, just 10% of its current age of billion years. The galaxy was first spotted in 2013 by the National Science Foundation’s South Pole Telescope. Other observatories, such as the Hubble Space Telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile, have observed it since. But the Webb telescope’s infrared capabilities, which can see light invisible to the human eye and peer through cosmic dust, was able to capture new details about the galaxy. And the space observatory received a helping hand from a phenomenon called gravitational lensing. “This magnification happens when two galaxies are almost perfectly aligned from the Earth’s point of view, and light from the background galaxy is warped and magnified by the foreground galaxy into a ring-like shape, known as an Einstein ring,” said study coauthor Joaquin Vieira, professor of astronomy and physics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, in a statement. Gravitational lensing was originally predicted in Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. “By combining Webb’s amazing capabilities with a natural ‘cosmic magnifying glass,’ we were able to see even more detail than we otherwise could,” said lead study author Justin Spilker, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Texas A&M University, in a statement. “That level of magnification is actually what made us interested in looking at this galaxy with Webb in the first place, because it really lets us see all the rich details of what makes up a galaxy in the early universe that we could never do otherwise,” said Spilker, who is also a member of Texas A&M’s George P. and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy. Astronomers spotted the signature of the organic molecules during a careful analysis of Webb’s data. The molecules are common in space. Here on Earth, they are part of cancer-causing hydrocarbon emissions that contribute to the planet’s atmospheric pollution. Previously, astronomers thought polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons were a sign of star formation because they have observed the large molecules near bright young stars. But Webb’s data revealed the presence of these molecules may not have been an indicator of star birth in the early days of the universe. “Thanks to the high-definition images from Webb, we found a lot of regions with smoke but no star formation, and others with new stars forming but no smoke,” Spilker said. The unexpected finding is helping astronomers piece together answers to some of the lingering questions about the beginning of the universe. “Discoveries like this are precisely what Webb was built to do understand the earliest stages of the universe in new and exciting ways,” said study coauthor Kedar Phadke, a doctoral student of astronomy at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, in a statement. “It’s amazing that we can identify molecules billions of light-years away that we’re familiar with here on Earth, even if they show up in ways we don’t like, like smog and smoke. It’s also a powerful statement about the amazing capabilities of Webb that we’ve never had The researchers are looking forward to flexing Webb’s capabilities more in the future as they search for even more distant galaxies. “Now that we’ve shown this is possible for the first time, we’re looking forward to trying to understand whether it’s really true that where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” Spilker said. “Maybe we’ll even be able to find galaxies that are so young that complex molecules like these haven’t had time to form in the vacuum of space yet, so galaxies are all fire and no smoke. The only way to know for sure is to look at more galaxies, hopefully even further away than this Jerusalem Report logo small credit JPOST STAFFFor millennia, humanity has looked to the stars and pondered whether we are indeed alone in the Universe, and whether the answers to our existence are written in the Hubble Space Telescope, launched in 1991, was the first to provide scientists with glittering images of nebulas or star-forming regions, distant galaxies, and zoom in on other planets and their moons. While the telescope continues to orbit the Earth, it is limited in scope as it can only capture images in the visible the past 30 years, NASA scientists have been working on the next big project — the James-Webb Space telescope JWST — which was launched into space on Christmas Day and will attempt to photograph celestial bodies in the infrared spectrum, providing scientists with further clues as to how creation hope to use JWST to peer into the earliest images of the cosmos, by taking pictures of the first galaxies formed right after the Big Bang, nearly 100 million years highly sophisticated instrument was engineered to operate at very cold temperatures from around -223° C or -370° F, and cost $10 billion to construct its combination of complex mirrors and tools. It will also search for other life forms in areas where scientists believe may harbor life, such as Saturn’s and Jupiter’s moons, Enceladus and Europa. The Mrk 1337, a weakly-barred spiral galaxy. credit ESA/HUBBLE/NASAIf that isn’t impressive enough, the Jewish nation played a small but impressive part in helping accomplish this feat. The Jerusalem Report spoke with Dr. Eliad Peretz, a program manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, and Dr. Adi Ninio-Greenberg, a planetary scientist at the Israel Space Agency who relayed some scientific plans for the extensive isn’t a simple journey to land at the world’s top space agency. Peretz serves as lead researcher for New Space Missions for renowned astrophysicist and cosmologist Dr. John Mather. Mather also serves as the JWST project scientist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in physics in 2006 for his work studying the pattern of remnant radiation following the Big to the widely accepted theory, the universe was originally a very hot place, but as it expanded the gas within it cooled down. Mather was able to map primordial hot and cold spots in that area, known as the cosmic microwave background radiation. Those areas have been regarded as the seeds for giant clusters of galaxies that scientists believe were some of the first to ever be found, and stretch hundreds of millions of light-years across the Universe.“I knew I wanted to work for NASA ever since I was five and gazed up at the stars,” says Peretz, adding that he pursued a bachelor’s in aerospace engineering at the Technion Institute of Technology, and later a master’s and PhD at Cornell of now, Hubble plans on operating in parallel to JWST. “Hubble was used to discover planetary systems outside of our solar system, something it was not designed to do,” Peretz explained. “We might discover new ways to use Webb as science advances. JWST embarked on its month-long journey to L2, an area where the gravitational power from the Earth, Sun, and Moon balances out perfectly and enables the telescope to operate in an area with colder temperatures and low gravity so that it can clearly observe objects in the infrared spectrum, which are invisible to the human eye.”The telescope is also equipped with a sun shield on the bottom, which acts as a buffer between the hotter side that faces the Sun, and protects the sensitive optical mirrors and instruments that need colder temperatures to function properly. Since it needed to be compacted for launch, the telescope underwent a long process of slowly and securely unfolding certain parts in space. In a few months, it will begin observing two main regions. And scientists are waiting with bated breath to receive those first few images.“It’s super exciting,” says of its first targets include Enceladus and Europa, where scientists have seen traces of plumes of gas emanating from the celestial bodies, possibly from water signatures. Many believe that subsurface oceans might exist beneath the moons’ icy exteriors. JWST also plans on capturing images of Alpha Centauri, a nearby galaxy and our closest neighbor, which could prove to be a habitable zone.“It also has interesting planetary bodies orbiting around a central star, much like our sun,” Peretz says. “It’s unclear what might be out there. We also want to look for some of the earliest stars and galaxies, which were formed right after the Big Bang.” The Pillars of Creation, within the Eagle nebula. credit ESA/HUBBLE/NASAHe recalled Hubble’s famous image “Pillars of Creation,” within the Eagle nebula, where columns of dust swirl out of cloud-like pillars. In the image, stars can be viewed emerging from dark mysterious clouds. Webb, however, will allow scientists to peer through that dust and see stars in the infrared as they are forming.“That can tell us a lot about the creation of the Universe,” he said. “It gets us back to one of our main questions in astrophysics how does the Universe work, and how did we get here? We aim to explore the origin of the evolution of galaxies, stars and planets that make up our Universe.”Ninio-Greenberg said that JWST “will allow us to look back in time, and see the Universe in its primordial conditions, and some of the earliest galaxies, which are 100 million years old for reference, our Universe is billion years old. JWST will also look for life outside of Earth, and search for exoplanets or similar solar systems near our Milky Way galaxy. The telescope can measure exoplanets’ atmospheres and their components, and see whether they’re habitable for humans.“The telescope can measure the amount of light that stars emit, but if an exoplanet is in the way it could potentially block out light from that star. We can see what its atmosphere is composed of, by using the telescope’s mirrors to remove its light intensity like in an eclipse. We can then measure the atmosphere by using infrared light, which is sensitive to chemical signatures of molecules in the atmosphere.”A veteran of the Israeli Air Force where she served as head of Space Division Technologies, she also holds a PhD in astrophysics from Tel Aviv University. And Ninio-Greenberg has been looking up at the stars since she was a child.“When I was nine years old, my father told me that looking to the stars is like looking back in time, and I believe that this telescope is the greatest time machine engineered in human history,” she says. “We want to study those earliest galaxies, and gaze at the broadest and deepest sections of the Universe, which will give us clues as to how it all began.”JWST is uniquely constructed and enables it to gather light from far-off objects that emit weak light. It can also provide sharper resolution for objects closeby. “You could even see a bee on the Moon,” she instrument includes a hefty sun shield — the size of a tennis court — to protect the telescope’s sensitive optical systems and ensure they don’t overheat. Over the past few weeks, JWST has managed to unfold successfully in space. But capturing those spectacular images of the heavenly bodies and providing scientists with clues to how it all began isn’t the end, but merely the beginning.“We’re now thinking about what this mission could mean to future missions, what else we could explore, and are already learning how to create new telescopes,” said science teaches, there is always more left to explore. And when it comes to Webb, the questions are infinite and abound. Perhaps the questions that humanity will attempt to answer aren’t so far away after all. â– Space June 5, 2023 / 1035 AM / CBS News Photo shows star about to become supernova New image from James Webb Telescope shows star about to become supernova 0600 New images from the James Webb Space Telescope provide a glimpse into what a galaxy looks like 17 million light-years away. The images, shared on Friday, are part of an "astronomical treasure trove" focused on collecting star formation observations. The "delicate tracery of dust and bright star clusters" are found in NGC 5068, a spiral galaxy about 17 million light-years from Earth, NASA said. According to the telescope's website, the galaxy is located in the Virgo constellation, and the latest images show it "as never before." Webb’s looked at galaxies from both sides now…From dust structures in mid-infrared light to stars in near-infrared light, Webb’s dual vision is helping us to see star-forming regions — such as galaxy NGC 5068 — as never before NASA Webb Telescope NASAWebb June 2, 2023 One image shows what looks like a glowing white bar, marking the core of the galaxy, the European Space Agency said. "Thousands upon thousands of tiny stars that make it up can be seen, most dense in a whitish bar that forms its core," a European Space Agency description of the photo says. "Clumps and filaments of dust form an almost skeletal structure that follows the twist of the galaxy and its spiral arm. Large, glowing bubbles of red gas are hidden in the dust." In this image, from Webb's MIRI instrument, the dusty structure of the spiral galaxy and glowing bubbles of gas containing newly-formed star clusters are particularly prominent. ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, J. Lee and the PHANGS-JWST Team Another image captured by the telescope's MIRI instrument shows the galaxy with three asteroid trails seen by "tiny blue-green-red dots." But those asteroid tails didn't actually fly through the galaxy, NASA said. They only appeared because "they are much closer to the telescope than the distant target." "As Webb captures several images of the astronomical object, the asteroid moves, so it shows up in a slightly different place in each frame," the European Space Agency said. These galactic portraits are part of a mission to "create an astronomical treasure trove," the agency said, "a repository of observations of star formation in nearby galaxies." Before the Webb telescope, seeing past the gas and dust that surround newborn stars wasn't possible. But with the telescope's unique instruments, NASA said astronomers could see "right through the gargantuan clouds of dust in NGC 5068 and captured the processes of star formation as they happened." Having this trove is an effort to hopefully help astronomers make more advances in star and space research. In James Webb Space Telescope News From Space Space Li Cohen Li Cohen is a social media producer and trending content writer for CBS News. Thanks for reading CBS NEWS. Create your free account or log in for more features. Please enter email address to continue Please enter valid email address to continue The bright star at the center of NGC 3132, Southern Nebula Ring, while prominent when viewed by NASA's Webb Telescope in near-infrared light, plays a supporting role in sculpting the surrounding nebula. A second star, barely visible at lower left along one of the bright star's diffraction spikes, is the nebula's source. It has ejected at least eight layers of gas and dust over thousands of years. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI hide caption toggle caption NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI The bright star at the center of NGC 3132, Southern Nebula Ring, while prominent when viewed by NASA's Webb Telescope in near-infrared light, plays a supporting role in sculpting the surrounding nebula. A second star, barely visible at lower left along one of the bright star's diffraction spikes, is the nebula's source. It has ejected at least eight layers of gas and dust over thousands of years. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI The universe's splendor and breadth are on display like never before, thanks to a new batch of images that NASA released from the James Webb Space Telescope on Tuesday. The images from the new telescope are "really gorgeous," said NASA's Jane Rigby, the operations project scientist for the James Webb Space Telescope. "That's something that has been true for every image we've gotten with Webb," she added. "We can't take blank sky [images]. Everywhere we look, there's galaxies everywhere." The images reflect five areas of space that researchers agreed to target the exoplanet WASP-96 b; the Southern Ring Nebula; the Carina Nebula; Stephan's Quintet five galaxies in the constellation Pegasus; and the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723. A nursery for the stars One of the most eye-popping images released on Tuesday depicts what looks to be cosmic cliffs, valleys and mountains — albeit with mountains that stretch to seven light-years in height. What looks much like craggy mountains on a moonlit evening is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. Captured in infrared light by the Near-Infrared Camera NIRCam on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals previously obscured areas of star birth. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI hide caption toggle caption NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI What looks much like craggy mountains on a moonlit evening is actually the edge of a nearby, young, star-forming region NGC 3324 in the Carina Nebula. Captured in infrared light by the Near-Infrared Camera NIRCam on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, this image reveals previously obscured areas of star birth. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI The image captures part of a "stellar nursery called NGC 3324 at the northwest corner of the Carina Nebula," NASA said. It's roughly 7,600 light-years from Earth. "The blistering, ultraviolet radiation from the young stars is sculpting the nebula's wall by slowly eroding it away," the agency added. "Dramatic pillars tower above the glowing wall of gas, resisting this radiation. The 'steam' that appears to rise from the celestial 'mountains' is actually hot, ionized gas and hot dust streaming away from the nebula due to the relentless radiation." Galaxies from 'It's a Wonderful Life' stun scientists The tight galaxy group called Stephan's Quintet is a "laboratory" for scientists to study the powerful effects galaxies can exert on each other, thanks to new data from the Webb telescope. An enormous mosaic of Stephan's Quintet is the largest image to date from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, covering about one-fifth of the Moon's diameter. It contains over 150 million pixels and is constructed from almost 1,000 separate image files. The visual grouping of five galaxies was captured by Webb's Near-Infrared Camera NIRCam and Mid-Infrared Instrument MIRI. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI hide caption toggle caption NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI An enormous mosaic of Stephan's Quintet is the largest image to date from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, covering about one-fifth of the Moon's diameter. It contains over 150 million pixels and is constructed from almost 1,000 separate image files. The visual grouping of five galaxies was captured by Webb's Near-Infrared Camera NIRCam and Mid-Infrared Instrument MIRI. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI Researchers hope to learn more about how galaxies merge and interact, including triggering each other to form new stars, and how those processes might be impacted by supermassive black holes. The image casts the quintet in a new light, after they represented angels in Frank Capra's class film It's a Wonderful Life. "This enormous mosaic is Webb's largest image to date, covering about one-fifth of the Moon's diameter," NASA said. "It contains over 150 million pixels and is constructed from almost 1,000 separate image files." Catch a dying star Webb pulled the veil back on the second star in the Southern Ring Nebula, using mid-infrared wavelengths to capture it in extraordinary detail. "The star closely orbits its companion as it periodically ejects layers of gas and dust," NASA said. "Together, the swirling duo have created a fantastic landscape of asymmetrical shells." The new image shows the nebula from a nearly head-on view. But if we could see it from its edge, NASA says, "its three-dimensional shape would more clearly look like two bowls placed together at the bottom, opening away from one another with a large hole at the center." Webb delivers a portrait of a puffy giant "WASP-96 b is a giant planet outside our solar system, composed mainly of gas," NASA said. "The planet, located nearly 1,150 light-years from Earth, orbits its star every days. It has about half the mass of Jupiter, and its discovery was announced in 2014." The agency didn't release a photo but rather a spectrum analysis of WASP-96 b's atmosphere, garnered from Webb sighting the WASP-96 b as it transited in front of a star. A transmission spectrum made from a single observation using Webb's Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph NIRISS reveals atmospheric characteristics of the hot gas giant exoplanet WASP-96 b. Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI hide caption toggle caption Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI A transmission spectrum made from a single observation using Webb's Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph NIRISS reveals atmospheric characteristics of the hot gas giant exoplanet WASP-96 b. Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI A light curve from Webb's Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph NIRISS shows the change in brightness of light from the WASP-96 star system over time as the planet transits the star. A transit occurs when an orbiting planet moves between the star and the telescope, blocking some of the light from the star. Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI hide caption toggle caption Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI A light curve from Webb's Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph NIRISS shows the change in brightness of light from the WASP-96 star system over time as the planet transits the star. A transit occurs when an orbiting planet moves between the star and the telescope, blocking some of the light from the star. Illustration NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI The analysis found the "chemical fingerprint" of water in the atmosphere, said Knicole Colon, a research astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. A look at some of the universe's first galaxies ever The trove of images comes one day after a jaw-dropping first image was published by NASA and the White House, more than six months after the telescope was launched from Earth. That first image showed the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723, known as Webb's First Deep Field. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has produced the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb's First Deep Field, this composite image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is overflowing with detail. The image shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it appeared billion years ago. NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI hide caption toggle caption NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has produced the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb's First Deep Field, this composite image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is overflowing with detail. The image shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it appeared billion years ago. NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI "If you held a grain of sand on the tip of your finger at arm's length, that is the part of the universe you are seeing — just one little speck of the universe," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said on Monday. But that speck contains multitudes. And thanks to the telescope's deep and sharp infrared images, Earthlings are getting a more detailed look at distant galaxies than was ever possible. That first image comprises thousands of galaxies, with even faint and diffuse structures visible for the first time. "This deep field, taken by Webb's Near-Infrared Camera NIRCam, is a composite made from images at different wavelengths, totaling hours – achieving depths at infrared wavelengths beyond the Hubble Space Telescope's deepest fields, which took weeks," NASA said. The stunning displays amount to a rich lesson in the history of the universe some of the galaxies are more than 13 billion years old, meaning they formed relatively soon after the Big Bang. For instance, the image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 amounts to a snapshot from billion years ago. Aside from gaping at stunning views like everyone else, researchers will use data from the Webb telescope "to learn more about the galaxies' masses, ages, histories, and compositions," according to NASA. The Webb Space Telescope is the culmination of an international program led by NASA. Its partners include the European Space Agency, or ESA, and the Canadian Space Agency. “This infrared image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope JWST was taken for the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey, or JADES, program. It shows a portion of an area of the sky known as GOODS-South, which has been well studied by the Hubble Space Telescope and other observatories. More than 45,000 galaxies are visible here.” Credits NASA, ESA, CSA, Brant Robertson UC Santa Cruz, Ben Johnson CfA, Sandro Tacchella Cambridge, Marcia Rieke University of Arizona, Daniel Eisenstein CfA. Image processing Alyssa Pagan STScI “Among the most fundamental questions in astronomy is How did the first stars and galaxies form?” NASA writes. The James Webb Space Telescope hasn’t been in space long, but it’s already delivering critical insights into this monumental question. JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey JADES Searches for Ancient Galaxies A new image captured as part of one of Webb’s most significant scientific programs, the JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey, or JADES, is not only visually stunning but also incredibly important for scientists working to understand the universe’s history, especially its earliest days. The Webb team explains, “In this image, blue, green, and red were assigned to Webb’s NIRCam Near-Infrared Camera data at and microns; and microns; and and microns F090W, F115W, and F150W; F200W, F277W, and F335M; and F356W, F410M, and F444W, respectively.” This is a 100 percent crop from the full-size Webb image. As part of JADES, Webb will dedicate just over a month of its valuable telescope time to capture and analyze very faint, distant galaxies. Some of the observations have already occurred, and the data continues to roll in from these early images. “While the data is still coming in, JADES already has discovered hundreds of galaxies that existed when the universe was less than 600 million years old. The team also has identified galaxies sparkling with a multitude of young, hot stars,” NASA explains. The area, GOODS-South, has also been imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope, which helps put in perspective just how much more detail Webb offers. This relatively recent image of GOODS-South was captured by Hubble in 2016. It’s a very impressive image, rich with galaxies, but Webb has been able to peer much further back in time thanks to its relatively higher resolution and sensitivity. Credit NASA, ESA/Hubble The Importance of Stars and the Epoch of Reionization “With JADES, we want to answer a lot of questions, like How did the earliest galaxies assemble themselves? How fast did they form stars? Why do some galaxies stop forming stars?” says Marcia Rieke of the University of Arizona in Tucson, co-lead of the JADES program. Ryan Endsley of the University of Texas at Austin led an investigation into the galaxies that existed a mere 500 to 850 million years following the big bang. This period, known as the Epoch of Reionization, remains quite mysterious. Credit NASA, ESA, CSA, Joyce Kang STScI NASA explains reionization, writing, “For hundreds of millions of years after the big bang, the universe was filled with a gaseous fog that made it opaque to energetic light. By one billion years after the big bang, the fog had cleared and the universe became transparent, a process known as reionization.” 100 percent crop Some scientists believe that supermassive black holes caused the eponymous reionization, others believe that galaxies full of young stars, which burn extremely hotly, were the impetus behind reionization. As part of JADES, Endsley and his colleagues have been studying these all-important distant, old galaxies using Webb’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph NIRSpec instrument. The team wanted to find evidence of star formation and find it they did. “Almost every single galaxy that we are finding shows these unusually strong emission line signatures indicating intense recent star formation. These early galaxies were very good at creating hot, massive stars,” says Endsley. 100 percent crop The bright, massive stars in turn fired torrents of ultraviolet light off into space, which changed the nature of surrounding gas from opaque to transparent. This was achieved through ionization, which is the process of removing electrons from their nuclei. Because early galaxies had so many hot, massive stars, they may have been the primary catalyst for the reionization process that has been hotly debated within the scientific community. “Endsley and his colleagues also found evidence that these young galaxies underwent periods of rapid star formation interspersed with quiet periods where fewer stars formed. These fits and starts may have occurred as galaxies captured clumps of the gaseous raw materials needed to form stars. Alternatively, since massive stars quickly explode, they may have injected energy into the surrounding environment periodically, preventing gas from condensing to form new stars,” writes NASA. 100 percent crop Revealing the Early Universe Another large component of JADES is searching for very early galaxies, which in this context are galaxies that existed less than 400 million years after the big bang. “By studying these galaxies, astronomers can explore how star formation in the early years after the big bang was different from what is seen in current times. The light from faraway galaxies is stretched to longer wavelengths and redder colors by the expansion of the universe — a phenomenon called redshift. By measuring a galaxy’s redshift, astronomers can learn how far away it is and, therefore, when it existed in the early universe,” NASA explains. Credit NASA, ESA, CSA, Joyce Kang STScI Webb has already transformed how scientists search for these very old galaxies. NASA says, “Before Webb, there were only a few dozen galaxies observed above a redshift of eight, when the universe was younger than 650 million years old, but JADES has now uncovered nearly a thousand of these extremely distant galaxies.” In relatively little observation time, Webb has revolutionized the search for ancient galaxies. 100 percent crop Spectrum is an important tool when searching for very old galaxies. “The gold standard for determining redshift involves looking at a galaxy’s spectrum, which measures its brightness at a myriad of closely spaced wavelengths. But a good approximation can be determined by taking photos of a galaxy using filters that each cover a narrow band of colors to get a handful of brightness measurements. In this way, researchers can determine estimates for the distances of many thousands of galaxies at once,” NASA explains. Kevin Hainline of the University of Arizona in Tucson and his colleagues used Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera NIRCAM, to obtain these critical spectral measurements, which are called photometric redshifts. Hainline’s team identified more than 700 galaxies that they believe existed when the universe was between 370 million and 650 million years old. The huge number of candidate galaxies far outstrips even the most optimistic estimates scientists had prior to Webb’s launch. Webb’s groundbreaking resolution and spectral sensitivity are paying huge dividends. “Previously, the earliest galaxies we could see just looked like little smudges. And yet those smudges represent millions or even billions of stars at the beginning of the universe,” says Hainline. “Now, we can see that some of them are actually extended objects with visible structure. We can see groupings of stars being born only a few hundred million years after the beginning of time.” Image credits NASA, ESA, CSA, Brant Robertson UC Santa Cruz, Ben Johnson CfA, Sandro Tacchella Cambridge, Marcia Rieke University of Arizona, Daniel Eisenstein CfA. Image processing Alyssa Pagan STScI

the telescope will photograph distant galaxies