The James Webb Space Telescope peered through dust and gas to reveal star formation in a rare wheel-shaped galaxy that formed in a long-ago galactic collapse.
The galaxy called Wheel for its striking resemblance to an old-fashioned carriage wheel, was previously studied by Hubble Space Telescopebut Webb’s infrared gaze revealed a wealth of never-before-seen detail in the galaxystructure.
Infrared light, which is essentially heat, penetrates clouds of dust, allowing the James Webb Space Telescope to peer into regions of space that are obscured to optical telescopes such as Hubble. In the new images Webb instruments NIRCam and MIRIrevealed an individual stars in the star-forming regions in the outer ring of the Pinwheel galaxy, as well as clusters of very young stars around the central supermassive galaxy Black holewhich is also shrouded in dust.
Gallery: The first pictures of the James Webb Space Telescope
The wheel located at about 500 million light years far from Earth in the constellation Sculptor in the southern sky, is a rather rare type of galaxy that astronomers call a ring galaxy. Scientists believe that long ago the Wheel was a common phenomenon spiral galaxysimilar to ours Milky Way. Then, about 700 to 800 million light years ago, it collided with a smaller galaxy.
The crash changed its shape and structure to what astronomers can see today, forming two ring-like structures, one surrounding the galactic center and the other framing the entire galaxy. The two rings expand outward from the center of the galaxy like “ripples in a pond,” said in a statement (opens in new tab).
As the outer ring expands, it pushes out the dust and gas that surrounds the galaxy and triggers star formation, according to STScI. The regions where new stars are born appear as small blue dots in the image and are scattered throughout the galaxy, but especially concentrated in the outer ring.
The MIRI camera on the James Webb Space Telescope reveals regions rich in hydrocarbons and silicate dust. (Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI)
Webb’s observations also reveal regions rich in hydrocarbons and silicate dust that form the spokes connecting the inner and outer rings. Earlier Hubble images could also distinguish the spokes, but Webb’s new observations make those features much clearer, STScI said.
The Cartheel galaxy is still transforming as a result of the previous catastrophe, and the new observations will help shed light on its past and future evolution.
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