James Webb Space Telescope: Multifaceted insights into intense star formation
In the Tarantula Nebula, stars form faster than anywhere else in our extended neighbourhood. The space telescope provides completely new insights.
The Tarantula Nebula, taken with the NIRCam (original image, 21 megabytes)
(Bild: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI)
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The James Webb Space Telescope has imaged thousands of new stars in the so-called Tarantula Nebula, providing an impressive image of the area of particular interest to researchers. The various instruments have not only made the young and particularly hot stars visible, but also the detailed structure of the dust and gas that make up the region. This gives astronomers a view of conditions similar to those in the young universe when a particularly large number of stars were formed. There are still many unanswered questions about this, which are now to be answered, NASA explains.
The most exciting star forming area
The Tarantula Nebula (30 Doradus) lies about 160,000 light years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way. The area is the largest and brightest of all the regions in our extended neighbourhood where many stars are formed at the same time. It is home to the hottest and largest stars we know of, explains ESA. In front of the near-infrared camera NIRCam, it resembles the home of a "burrowing tarantula covered in silk". The cavity in the centre has been hollowed out by radiation from a cluster of massive young stars. They glow bright blue in the image, writes ESA.
(Bild: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI)
Only the densest regions would resist this erosion, forming pillar-like structures that point in the direction of the stars. These pillars contain nascent protostars and the near-infrared spectrograph NIRSpec has probably discovered a star that is right in the process. It was just peeling out of its pillar and still had a bubble of dust around it. This can only be detected thanks to the high-resolution spectra that the space telescope can record. The MIRI (Mid-infrared Instrument), in turn, makes the distribution of the gas visible and shows particularly young protostars that are still gaining mass..
The Tarantula Nebula is so interesting for researchers because its chemical composition resembles that which was widespread during the heyday of star formation in the young universe. Star-forming regions in the Milky Way would not form stars as violently as the region in the neighbouring galaxy.
The Tarantula Nebula is therefore the closest and easiest area to observe, giving us a glimpse of star formation in the "cosmic dawn". The observations could be matched with the direct ones of the early universe. The space telescope is therefore just beginning to "rewrite the history of star formation", says the ESA.
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The James Webb Space Telescope is operated by the space agencies NASA, ESA and CSA and was launched on 25 December 2021. After deploying itself in a complex procedure, it arrived at the Lagrange point L2 a month later. Here it faces away from the Sun, Earth and Moon into space, so that their thermal radiation does not interfere with the infrared telescope. A huge protective screen blocks them.
Since it began scientific work at the beginning of July, the quality of the data has fascinated not only the research community. The first images are currently being published directly. The aim is for the scientific community to learn how to use the new observatory and its instruments as well as possible.
(mho)
