All Wallpapers

Detail of the globular cluster Messier 92 (M92) captured by Webb’s NIRCam instrument. This field of view covers the lower left quarter of the right half of the full image. Globular clusters are dense masses of tightly packed stars that all formed around the same time. In M92, there are about 300,000 stars packed into a ball about 100 light-years across. The night sky of a planet in the middle of M92 would shine with thousands of stars that appear thousands of times brighter than those in our own sky. The image shows stars at different distances from the center, which helps astronomers understand the motion of stars in the cluster, and the physics of that motion.

NGC 346, shown here in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), is a dynamic star cluster that lies within a nebula 200,000 light years away. Webb reveals the presence of many more building blocks than previously expected, not only for stars, but also planets, in the form of clouds packed with dust and hydrogen. The plumes and arcs of gas in this image contains two types of hydrogen. The pink gas represents energized hydrogen, which is typically as hot as around 10,000 °C (approximately 18,000 °F) or more, while the more orange gas represents dense, molecular hydrogen, which is much colder at around -200 °C (approximately -300 °F) or less, and associated dust. The colder gas provides an excellent environment for stars to form, and, as they do, they change the environment around them. The effect of this is seen in the various ridges throughout, which are created as the light of these young stars breaks down the dense clouds. The many pillars of glowing gas show the effects of this stellar erosion throughout the region.

Webb's image traces the star's scattered outflows that have reached farther into the cosmos. Most of the molecular gas that lies outside the band of cooler gas is also cold. It is also far clumpier, consisting of dense knots of molecular gas that form a halo around the central stars. By accounting for the temperatures and gas contents in both areas, inside and outside the band, and by combining Webb's data with precise measurements from other observatories, researchers were able to create far more accurate models to demonstrate when gas was ejected by the central star. What about the third star that is visible at the lower-right edge of the band within the nebula? From Webb's vantage point, it appears within the scene, but isn't part of the nebula itself.

The protostar within the dark cloud L1527, shown in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), is embedded within a cloud of material feeding its growth. Ejections from the star have cleared out cavities above and below it, whose boundaries glow orange and blue in this infrared view. The upper central region displays bubble-like shapes due to stellar “burps,” or sporadic ejections. Webb also detects filaments made of molecular hydrogen that has been shocked by past stellar ejections. The edges of the cavities at upper left and lower right appear straight, while the boundaries at upper right and lower left are curved. The region at lower right appears blue, as there’s less dust between it and Webb than the orange regions above it.

This image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope reveals at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars orbiting one another. Located just over 5,000 light-years from Earth, the system is known as Wolf-Rayet 140 because one of the stars is a Wolf-Rayet star. The other is an O-type star, one of the most massive star types known. Each ring was created when the two stars came close together and their stellar winds (streams of gas they blow into space) collided, compressing the gas and forming dust. A ring is produced once per orbit, every 7.93 years. A Wolf-Rayet star is an O-type star born with at least 25 times more mass than our Sun that is nearing the end of its life, when it will likely collapse directly to black hole, or explode as a supernova. These delays between periods of dust production create the unique ring pattern. Some Wolf-Rayet binaries in which the stars are close enough together and have circular orbits produce dust continuously, often forming a pinwheel pattern. WR 140's rings are also referred to as shells because they are not perfectly circular and are thicker and wider than they appear in the image. The rings appear brighter in some areas but are almost invisible in others, rather than forming a perfect "bullseye" pattern. That's because production of dust is variable as the stars get close to one another, and because Webb views the system at an angle and is not looking directly at the orbital plane of the stars. One of the densest regions of dust production creates the bright feature appearing at 2 o'clock. The image was taken by the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), now managed by the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center. MIRI was developed through a 50-50 partnership between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency).

At the longer wavelengths of light captured by its Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), Webb focuses on the area surrounding the central star cluster and unveils a very different view of the Tarantula Nebula. In this light, the young hot stars of the cluster fade in brilliance, and glowing gas and dust come forward. Abundant hydrocarbons light up the surfaces of the dust clouds, shown in blue and purple. Much of the nebula takes on a more ghostly, diffuse appearance because mid-infrared light is able to show more of what is happening deeper inside the clouds. Still-embedded protostars pop into view within their dusty cocoons, including a bright group at the very top edge of the image, left of center. Other areas appear dark, like in the lower-left corner of the image. This indicates the densest areas of dust in the nebula, that even mid-infrared wavelengths cannot penetrate. These could be the sites of future, or current, star formation. MIRI was contributed by ESA and NASA, with the instrument designed and built by a consortium of nationally funded European Institutes (The MIRI European Consortium) in partnership with JPL and the University of Arizona.

This image of the Cartwheel and its companion galaxies is a composite from Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) and Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), which reveals details that are difficult to see in the individual images alone. This galaxy formed as the result of a high-speed collision that occurred about 400 million years ago. The Cartwheel is composed of two rings, a bright inner ring and a colorful outer ring. Both rings expand outward from the center of the collision like shockwaves. However, despite the impact, much of the character of the large, spiral galaxy that existed before the collision remains, including its rotating arms. This leads to the “spokes” that inspired the name of the Cartwheel Galaxy, which are the bright red streaks seen between the inner and outer rings. These brilliant red hues, located not only throughout the Cartwheel, but also the companion spiral galaxy at the top left, are caused by glowing, hydrocarbon-rich dust. In this near- and mid-infrared composite image, MIRI data are colored red while NIRCam data are colored blue, orange, and yellow. Amidst the red swirls of dust, there are many individual blue dots, which represent individual stars or pockets of star formation. NIRCam also defines the difference between the older star populations and dense dust in the core and the younger star populations outside of it. Webb’s observations capture the Cartwheel in a very transitory stage. The form that the Cartwheel Galaxy will eventually take, given these two competing forces, is still a mystery. However, this snapshot provides perspective on what happened to the galaxy in the past and what it will do in the future. NIRCam was built by a team at the University of Arizona and Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Technology Center. MIRI was contributed by ESA and NASA, with the instrument designed and built by a consortium of nationally funded European Institutes (The MIRI European Consortium) in partnership with JPL and the University of Arizona.

Webb's first deep field image, revealing thousands of distant galaxies in a tiny patch of sky through gravitational lensing by galaxy cluster SMACS 0723.

NASA's Webb Telescope has revealed the cloak of dust around the second star, shown at left in red, at the center of the Southern Ring Nebula for the first time. It is a hot, dense white dwarf star. As it transformed into a white dwarf, the star periodically ejected mass, the shells of material you see here. The bluer star at right in this image has also shaped the scene, helping stir up the ejected material. The disk around the stars is also wobbling, shooting out spirals of gas and dust over long periods of time. Webb captured this scene in mid-infrared light, most of which can only be observed from space. Mid-infrared light helps researchers detect objects enshrouded in dust, like the red star. This Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) image also offers an incredible amount of detail, including a cache of distant galaxies in the background.

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). With its powerful, infrared vision and extremely high spatial resolution, Webb shows never-before-seen details in this galaxy group. Sparkling clusters of millions of young stars and starburst regions of fresh star birth grace the image. Sweeping tails of gas, dust and stars are being pulled from several of the galaxies due to gravitational interactions. Most dramatically, Webb's MIRI instrument captures huge shock waves as one of the galaxies, NGC 7318B, smashes through the cluster.

With its powerful, mid-infrared vision, the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) shows never-before-seen details of Stephan’s Quintet, a visual grouping of five galaxies. MIRI pierced through dust-enshrouded regions to reveal huge shock waves and tidal tails, gas and stars stripped from the outer regions of the galaxies by interactions. It also unveiled hidden areas of star formation. The new information from MIRI provides invaluable insights into how galactic interactions may have driven galaxy evolution in the early universe. This image contains one more MIRI filter than was used in the NIRCam-MIRI composite picture. The image processing specialists at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore opted to use all three MIRI filters and the colors red, green and blue to most clearly differentiate the galaxy features from each other and the shock waves between the galaxies. In this image, red denotes dusty, star-forming regions, as well as extremely distant, early galaxies and galaxies enshrouded in thick dust. Blue point sources show stars or star clusters without dust. Diffuse areas of blue indicate dust that has a significant amount of large hydrocarbon molecules. For small background galaxies scattered throughout the image, the green and yellow colors represent more distant, earlier galaxies that are rich in these hydrocarbons as well. Stephan’s Quintet’s topmost galaxy – NGC 7319 – harbors a supermassive black hole 24 million times the mass of the Sun. It is actively accreting material and puts out light energy equivalent to 40 billion Suns. MIRI sees through the dust surrounding this black hole to unveil the strikingly bright active galactic nucleus. As a bonus, the deep mid-infrared sensitivity of MIRI revealed a sea of previously unresolved background galaxies reminiscent of Hubble’s Deep Fields. Together, the five galaxies of Stephan’s Quintet are also known as the Hickson Compact Group 92 (HCG 92). Although called a “quintet,” only four of the galaxies are truly close together and caught up in a cosmic dance. The fifth and leftmost galaxy, called NGC 7320, is well in the foreground compared with the other four. NGC 7320 resides 40 million light-years from Earth, while the other four galaxies (NGC 7317, NGC 7318A, NGC 7318B, and NGC 7319) are about 290 million light-years away. This is still fairly close in cosmic terms, compared with more distant galaxies billions of light-years away. Studying these relatively nearby galaxies helps scientists better understand structures seen in a much more distant universe. This proximity provides astronomers a ringside seat for witnessing the merging of and interactions between galaxies that are so crucial to all of galaxy evolution. Rarely do scientists see in so much exquisite detail how interacting galaxies trigger star formation in each other, and how the gas in these galaxies is being disturbed. Stephan’s Quintet is a fantastic “laboratory” for studying these processes fundamental to all galaxies. Tight groups like this may have been more common in the early universe when their superheated, infalling material may have fueled very energetic black holes called quasars. Even today, the topmost galaxy in the group – NGC 7319 – harbors an active galactic nucleus, a supermassive black hole that is actively pulling in material. MIRI was contributed by ESA and NASA, with the instrument designed and built by a consortium of nationally funded European Institutes (The MIRI European Consortium) in partnership with JPL and the University of Arizona. For a full array of Webb’s first images and spectra, including downloadable files, please visit: https://webbtelescope.org/news/first-images