With a hypnotic new image released on Tuesday (August 29), the James Webb Space Telescope is letting us peer inside a spiral galaxy floating about 27 million light-years from Earth.
It’s a lifelike shot that represents a world named after him M51 (also known as NGC 5194 or the Whirlpool Galaxy) brilliantly captures the rocky relationship this galaxy has with its close neighbour, a dwarf galaxy called NGC 5195. Indeed, in part because of this galactic interaction, M51 may have such an interaction. . Primarily ornate pattern.
“The gravitational influence of M51’s smaller companion is believed to be partly responsible for the stately nature of the galaxy’s prominent and distinct spiral arms,” the European Space Agency said. in the current situation about visual.
And on noting those amazing spiral arms, one interesting fact about the M51 is that its sinuous structure is called the “grand design.” galaxy rather than just a standard spiral galaxy.
Related: The James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble will help NASA’s Juno probe study Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io
While a typical spiral galaxy also exhibits swirling arms like M51, Spirals of large design They make up about a tenth of all spiral galaxies and have strongly defined arms that emanate from a well-defined core region. Naturally, this makes them very beautiful when viewed from our vantage point on Earth. (It is technically For discussion Whether we have milky way It’s a galaxy of great design, too.)
The European Space Agency even calls M51 one of the “most attractive galaxies in amateur and professional astronomy.” As you can see, it was Connie’s inspiration as far back as As 2001.
So, what am I looking at here?
for photo M51, JWST It has been exploited in two powerful infrared tools: medium infrared instrument and a near infrared camera. This, as you might expect, presented two separate perspectives on the subject of the galaxy (although there was a composite image that combined the two).
As the name suggests, both devices are designed to capture images of the distant universe by decoding infrared signals emitted by distant stars and galaxies. Once these signals make their way into the telescope’s gold-plated hexagonal mirrors, they are reflected back to sensors that can then analyze the data for us. This part is actually why the James Webb Space Telescope is so important – human eyes can’t see infrared light (we can only see visible light) and so this machine is literally programmed to decode the universe invisible to us.
But what this means is that, as with all JWST images, my M51 image is colorized.
However, the reason the scientists added such coffee-colored hues and allowed for shimmering white accents in these images of M51 goes way beyond aesthetics. Scientific ingenuity like this helps bring out some important details that might otherwise go unnoticed and blurred in the rest of the scene.
For example, the dark red features in NIRCam’s photoAccording to the European Space Agency, it indicates warm filamentous dust in the world while the orange-yellow color shows patches of ionized gas stimulated by recently formed star clusters. The agency explained that “stellar reactions have a significant impact on the center of the galaxy and create complex networks of bright knots in addition to cavernous black bubbles.”
Stellar feedback refers to the way stars pour energy into their surroundings, triggering different processes that can dictate things like the formation rate of other young stars.
In the Image centered around MIRI By contrast, on M51, the empty recesses and the shiny threads appear to alternate, giving the impression of ripples spreading out from the spiral arms. It also indicates a more dramatic filament structure overall when compared to the NIRCam image. This is because some of the slivers of light associated with dust grains and particles, the agency says, “illuminate the cold gas of the galaxy.” It might be a welcome reminder, though some Some minor bugs reported by the JWST team regarding MIRI He stays healthy.
By piecing together MIRI and NIRCam images, the scientists developed a composite image that covers all of these fascinating nuances.
Part of a series of observations known as Feedback in Extragalactic Star Clusters, or FEAST, the agency said, “These observations are designed to highlight the interaction between stellar reactions and star formation in environments outside our galaxy.”
It was in 2011 when the Hubble Space Telescope’s view of M51, taken in visible light that we can see, enthralled scientists with its grandeur. Almost poetically, the team behind this swirling image states that “Although Hubble provides clear images of the internal structure of galaxies like M51, the planned James Webb Space Telescope is expected to produce even sharper images.”
Well, here we are.
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