The James Webb Space Telescope continues to produce amazing photos. This August 2, he surprised the scientific community with an image that his instruments managed to capture: peek into the chaos of the Cartwheel galaxy, revealing new details regarding star formation and black holes.
This peculiar galaxy does not appear alone. Webb’s powerful infrared gaze has taken a detailed snapshot of Cartwheel, but also of two smaller companion galaxies once morest a backdrop of many other galaxies.
The snapshot, which also reveals the behavior of the black hole within the galactic center of the galaxy, provides a new view of how it has changed over billions of years, says NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).
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The Cartwheel galaxy is located regarding 500 million light years in the constellation Sculptorsupposes an unusual vision: its appearance, very similar to that of a cart wheel, is the result of an intense event; that of a high-speed collision between a large spiral galaxy and a smaller one, not visible in this image.
Although it is not the first time that a telescope has captured an image of this stellar group, the Hubble Space Telescope had already done it, for instance. This is a galaxy that has been shrouded in mystery. “Perhaps literally given the amount of dust that obscures the view,” say NASA and ESA. The James Webb, with his ability to detect infrared light, now discovers new data regarding its nature. For example, the information collected by the MIRI instrument it reveals regions within the galaxy rich in hydrocarbons and other chemical compounds, as well as silicate dust.
Collisions of galactic proportions always cause a cascade of different and smaller events between the galaxies involved; Cartwheel is no exception. The collision mainly affected its shape and structure. This galaxy has two rings, a bright inner one and a colored surrounding one. These expand outward from the center of the collision, like ripples in a pond following a stone is thrown into it.
Because of these distinctive features, astronomers call it a ring galaxy, a less common structure than spiral galaxies like the Milky Way.
The bright core contains a huge amount of hot dust, and the brightest areas are home to gigantic clusters of young stars.
On the other hand, the outer ring, that has been expanding for regarding 440 million years, it is dominated by star formation and supernovae. As this ring expands, it penetrates the surrounding gas and triggers star formation.
These regions form a series of spiral spokes that essentially form the skeleton of the galaxy. These had already been seen in Hubble observations published in 2018, but they become much more prominent in this Webb image. The Webb’s photo underscores that Cartwheel is in a very transitory stage. The galaxy, which was presumably a normal spiral galaxy like the Milky Way before its collision, will continue to transform.
Although Webb offers a snapshot of the current state of the galaxy, he also provides a glimpse of what has happened to this galaxy in the past and how it will evolve in the future.
The collaboration of NASA, ESA and the Canadian CSA has made possible the James Webb, which also has Spanish participation and whose first image was known on July 11.
On its Twitter account today NASA has said: “¡Webb is on the crack!”, while the ESA has written: “Who is ready for a stellar gymnastics? This beautiful new image from Webb reveals new details regarding star formation and black holes.”
On July 13, the James Webb would have given its first four photographs with which scientists assured the beginning of a new astronomical era that ventured into knowing the origins of the universe and possible discoveries regarding extraterrestrial life.
