It’s always darkest before the dawn

 

It’s always darkest before the dawn.⁣

⁣This image from our James Webb Space Telescope shows N79, a massive star-forming region within the Large Magellanic Cloud (a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way). At mid-infrared wavelengths, Webb reveals glowing gas and dust deep within the clouds, as well as embedded baby stars.⁣

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N79 produces stars at a furious rate, much faster than star-forming regions found in our own galaxy. In fact, N79’s chemical composition is similar to those from the early universe, when star formation was at its peak.⁣

Here, those vivid rays resembling sunlight are actually diffraction spikes for a bright star. Most noticeable for bright, compact objects, diffraction spikes are somewhat like a telescope’s “signature.” The eight-point pattern is the result of the telescope’s hexagonal mirror design, combined with its secondary mirror struts. Meanwhile, our Hubble Space Telescope produces a four-pointed diffraction spike pattern due to its circular mirror.⁣

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Image description: A bright young star, located in the upper left quadrant, shines through layers of wispy white and blue clouds on a dark background. The star is surrounded by thick orange spikes in an eight-pointed pattern, overlaid across the majority of the frame. A patch of greenish-yellow clouds appears in the top right area of the image. There are a couple other bright spots seen as glowing yellow dots among the clouds, as well as another bright star with smaller blue diffraction spikes in the bottom right corner.⁣

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Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, O. Nayak, M. Meixner⁣

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#NASA #NASAWebb #JWST #Space #Astronomy #Astrophotography #Stars #Universe #Telescope

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23 January 2024