Representing mankind's endless curiosity and desire to solve the mysteries of their homes at the highest level, the James Webb Space Telescope exceeded the expectations of astronomers in its first year of science operations and captivated the world with stunning images.

Stunning Images from the James Webb Space Telescope!

The adventure, which started with the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope in 1990, continues today with the James Webb Space Telescope (Webb), which is much larger than Hubble and launched from French Guiana with the Ariane 5 rocket on December 25, 2021. We will be able to see in much greater detail what we see with Hubble and find definitive answers to questions about the nature of the universe. Webb, an international effort between NASA, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency), was sent into space as a magnificent tool to investigate space objects that have appeared since the first formation of the universe.

Let's take a look at these data one by one.

1. Data: Deep Field: SMACS 0723 (The Deepest Infrared Image of Universe Yet)

This initial data was the most detailed infrared image ever taken of the farthest reaches of the universe. This stunningly detailed image of the SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster made history as the telescope's first deep-field study.

The telescope's advanced infrared cameras have helped the scientists to get a very clear view of the thousands of galaxies in the cluster. Although the image above seems like a huge area, it represents the size of a tiny grain of sand in a desert on Earth in our universe.

This image is actually an image of the cluster 4.6 billion years ago. Because of the finite speed of light, when you gaze up into the night sky, you are actually looking into the past. For example, the Sun is approximately 150 million kilometers away from the Earth, and according to Sun's distance to Earth in light year, every time we look at the Sun, we actually see 8.3 minutes before that moment. The massive mass of the SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster works like a gravitational lens, bending and stretching light from more distant galaxies. This is called the gravitational lensing effect. Due to this effect, you can see galaxies flattened at the edges of the center.

As Webb searches for the universe's earliest galaxies, scientists will soon start to discover more about the galaxies' masses, ages, histories, and compositions.

2. Data: Exoplanet: WASP-96 B (Steamy Atmosphere of Exoplanet in Detail)

Webb also collects information about exoplanets that our campers research in the training package called Planet Hunters during the distance learning programs.

Webb spotted water marks in the atmosphere of planet WASP-96 B, a hot gas giant orbiting a Sun-like star, and found spectacular evidence of clouds and fog forming on the planet.

This discovery, based on small variations in the brightness of light tones from the planet, thereby identifying the presence of certain gas molecules, is the most detailed study in this field to date. It also confirms Webb's incredible ability to probe atmospheres which are hundreds of light-years away.

3. Data: Stellar Death: Planetary Nebula NGC 3132 (Dying Star’s Final ‘Performance’)

The Southern Ring nebula, photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1998, is actually a nebula formed by the explosion of a medium-mass star. Although the dim star, in the center of this image has reached the end of its life, spewing gas and dust in all directionsfor millions of years, these gases and dusts can combine to form one or more planets within the nebula.

Two cameras aboard Webb obtained the most recent photograph of this planetary nebula, officially known as the Southern Ring Nebula and cataloged as NGC 3132. The nebula is about 2,500 light-years away from the Earth.

4. Data: Interacting Galaxies: Stephan's Quintet

Webb's powerful infrared vision and extremely high resolution cameras reveal details never seen before in this galaxy group. The image is dotted with glowing clusters of millions of young stars and starburst regions where new star birth takes place. Although called the quintet, only four of these galaxies actually interact with each other. The fifth and leftmost galaxy are closer to the Earth and do not interact with the others. The leftmost galaxy is only 40 million light-years away, while the other four are nearly 290 million light-years away.

This massive mosaic is Webb's largest image to date. It contains over 150 million pixels, which covers about one-fifth of the Moon's diameter and is made up of nearly 1,000 different image files. Webb's findings shed new light on how galactic interactions may have shaped galaxy evolution in the early universe.

5. Data: Star Forming Region: NGC 3324 In Carina Nebula

This landscape of "mountains" and "valleys" which covered by the shining stars is actually the young star-forming region known as NGC 3324 near the Carina Nebula. This image, captured with infrared light by the James Webb Space Telescope, reveals previously invisible stellar birth fields for the first time.

While this stunning image of Webb's "Cosmic Cliffs" looks like a landscape image of steep mountains on Earth, they are the boundary of NGC 3324's massive void in reality, with what appears to be a hilly area about 7 light-years high in this image. High ultraviolet radiation and stellar winds from massive, hot, young stars above the area shown in this image created the recess in the left-middle portion of the image.

As we mentioned at the beginning, if you consider the universe as all of the beaches on the Earth, this is maybe a mineral molecule which is located in a grain of sand. In the future, we will learn more, be surprised more…

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