NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope was launched at the end of last year. NASA released the telescope’s first full-color image on the day before (11th) US time, which is believed to be the deepest and clearest in the universe so far. Image: It records a 4.6 billion-year-old galaxy cluster called SMACS 0723, which is believed to help further understand the early days of the universe. NASA administrator Bill Nelson pointed out that the image recorded light as far back as 13 billion years ago. Later, NASA released more images yesterday, including more nebulae, galaxy clusters, and exoplanet images, such as the Carina Nebula, the Southern Ring Nebula, and the Stephen Quintet.
President BidenAttending the launch of the first image, he said that the images captured by the telescope prove that the United States can do great things, and can remind people and children that nothing is beyond everyone’s ability.
In addition, at the press conference of the first image,NASA Administrator Bill Nelson saidIn the galaxy cluster image of SMACS 0723, there are some fainter light spots in the background, which are believed to date back to 13 billion years ago, and the “Big Bang”, which is regarded as the origin of the universe, was 13.8 billion years ago. The faint point of light is fairly close to the time of the Big Bang.
Later, NASA released more images on the 12th US time, in which the telescope captured an image of a star called NGC 3132 in the Southern Ring nebula: a huge cloud of gas expelled by a dying star It consists of a cloud of gas and dust regarding 2,500 light-years away from Earth. The image on the left is obtained through near-infrared light, and the image on the right is obtained through mid-infrared light.
The telescope’s image also includes Stephen’s Quintet: a compact cluster of five galaxies with an active black hole at the center. Although the existence of the black hole cannot be seen in the image, it can be seen that there is matter rotating around, showing the tendency of swallowing.
The image released by NASA this time, the Carina nebula can be described as quite “eye-catching”. The image is from a star in the nebula called NGC 3324, located 7,600 light-years away from Earth. The images are so detailed that researchers can discern bubbles, jets from newborn stars, and hundreds of never-before-seen stars forming a mountain range.
The universe is still in the stage of continuous expansion, and in physics, the light of objects will be stretched longer and longer with the distance, and the wavelength of visible light will increase and the frequency will decrease, that is, redshift (Redshift); When pulled into the infrared, it is detected and recorded by space telescopes. The Hubble Space Telescope 30 years ago was able to transmit distant space images to NASA, and the $9 billion Webb Space Telescope’s instruments can produce images that are three times sharper and 100 times more sensitive than Hubble’s.
