This amazing Webb telescope image reveals things that scientists can’t explain

The James Webb Space Telescope has made it possible for astronomers to see things they can’t explain.

At least not yet.

in the new research(Opens in a new tab) From Webb – the most powerful space observatory ever built – astronomers have spent 50 hours looking into the deepest universe, discovering some of the first galaxies ever formed, more than 13 billion years ago. Capturing such a rich cosmic landscape, with the smallest objects humanity has ever glimpsed, is an amazing feat. But the data also reveals that these primordial galaxies released a huge amount of energy into space – 10 times More than scientists expected.

The “main” question is how These fledgling galaxies achieved just that, Pablo J. Perez Gonzalez, an astrophysicist at the Center for Astrobiology in Spain, said in a statement. Strange black holes? live stars? Pérez-González is the author of the research, which was published in the scientific journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The Webb telescope is a very sensitive instrument, with the ability to capture some of the farthest light in space. This is because Webb sees a type of light that we cannot see, called infrared, which travels at longer wavelengths than visible light. Crucially, the ancient light is expanding as the universe expands, which means it has changed and “redshifted”.

Thus, the powerful Webb can see the energy that the early galaxies created. Select astronomers 44 galaxies likely formed during the first 500 million years of the universe’s life. Originally, this energy was emitted as ultraviolet light, but it also extended into infrared.

In the image below, released by the researchers, you can see:

• Left: A deep field view of the universe with vivid spiral galaxies in the foreground and a large number of older galaxies in the distance. Almost all of these objects are galaxies.

• Right: Magnified views of three highly redshifted galaxies releasing unexpected amounts of energy. “They formed in the first 200 to 500 million years after the Big Bang, when the universe was 1-5 percent of today’s age.” [age]A statement about the research explains.

The electromagnetic spectrum shows all wavelengths of light, such as visible light, infrared, ultraviolet, and beyond.
Credit: NASA

Astronomers have simulated, using advanced computing, how the universe evolved over billions of years, starting with the formation of the first stars and galaxies, and eventually creating the organic materials essential to life. But no simulation predicted such intense emissions of ultraviolet energy. What might explain that?

They could be stars that are young and energetic, hotter than our average-sized Sun, and emitting huge amounts of energy into space. or, It is possible that this ancient light was generated by supermassive black holes, which are hundreds of thousands to billions of times the mass of the Sun and are usually found at the centers of galaxies, such as our own Milky Way.

But this raises another question: “Where did these supermassive black holes come from?” Perez Gonzalez asked.

“Currently, JWST provides us with many more questions than answers, but these new lines of research are exciting.”

He wonders how such gigantic objects – with gravity so intense not even light can escape – formed so quickly, so early in the history of the universe. Most black holes are formed from exploding stars, but might these black holes have formed in another way? many questions.

“Currently, JWST provides us with many more questions than answers, but these new lines of research are exciting,” the researchers said.

Stay tuned for more Webb answers and questions.

Artist’s illustration of the James Webb Space Telescope orbiting the Sun a million miles from Earth.
Credit: NASA

Webb telescope’s powerful capabilities

The Webb telescope — a science collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency — is designed to delve into the deepest universe and reveal unprecedented insights into the early universe. But it also has its eye on interesting planets in our galaxy, and even planets in our solar system.

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Here’s how Webb achieves things like no other, and will likely do for decades:

• Giant mirror: Webb’s mirror, which captures the light, is more than 21 feet across. This is two and a half times larger than the mirror of the Hubble Space Telescope. Capturing more light allows Webb to see more ancient, distant objects. As shown above, the telescope is staring at stars and galaxies that formed more than 13 billion years ago, just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang.

  “We will see the first stars and galaxies ever formed,” Jean Creighton, astronomer and director of the Manfred Olson Planetarium at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, told Mashable in 2021.

• infrared view: Unlike Hubble, which largely sees light visible to us, Webb is primarily an infrared telescope, meaning it sees light in the infrared spectrum. This allows us to see more of the universe. Infrared is longer wavelengths(Opens in a new tab) of visible light, and thus the light waves slip more efficiently through cosmic clouds; Light does not often collide with these dense particles and is scattered. Ultimately, Webb’s infrared vision can penetrate places that Hubble cannot.

  “It lifts the veil,” Creighton said.

• Staring at distant exoplanets: Webb telescope He carries specialized equipment called a spectrophotometer(Opens in a new tab) It would revolutionize our understanding of these distant worlds. The instruments can decipher molecules (such as water, carbon dioxide and methane) present in the atmospheres of distant exoplanets – whether they are gas giants or smaller, rocky worlds. Webb will be looking at exoplanets in the Milky Way. Who knows what we’ll find.

  “We may learn things we never thought about,” said Mercedes Lopez-Morales, an exoplanet researcher and astrophysicist at the University of California, San Francisco. Center for Astrophysics – Harvard and Smithsonian(Opens in a new tab)for Mashable in 2021.

  Astronomers have already managed to find interesting chemical reactions on a planet 700 light-years away, and the observatory has begun searching for one of the most anticipated places in the universe: the Earth-sized rocky planets in the TRAPPIST solar system.