Space Universe🌌

Got questions about Webb? 🤔 Here’s your chance to ask our instrumental Webb experts about how they’re involved with Webb’s science instruments. 1. Aaron Yung is a NASA Postdoctoral Fellow at @NASAGoddard. His expertise is in modeling galaxy formation in the early universe! He says: “I’m excited about upcoming Webb programs that will detect galaxies forming in the extremely distant universe, and provide insight into the key physical processes that shape the formation of these galaxies.”

Computer, enhance! Here is a comparison of the same target, as seen by the Spitzer Space Telescope and then in the Webb Telescope’s calibration images. Spitzer, NASA’s first Great Observatory to provide high-resolution images of the infrared universe, paved the way for Webb. With its significantly larger primary mirror and improved detectors, Webb will be able to see the infrared sky with improved clarity, enabling even more discoveries. Webb’s image, taken by its MIRI instrument, shows unprecedented detail. It features light from “polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs),” or molecules of carbon and hydrogen that help us better understand the gas that exists between stars.

🌍In order to turn Earth into a black hole, we would have to compress all its mass into a region the size of a marble. Just thought you might want to know.

As material swirls around a supermassive Black Hole, extreme forces can cause matter to be redirected away from the black hole in the form of jets traveling at almost the speed of light. Image: Cygnus A — its incredible jets span more than 600,000 light years!

🐙Today Chandra is studying 3C58, the remnant of a supernova observed in the year 1181 AD by Chinese and Japanese astronomers. A pulsar at the center of the remnant is producing jets of X-rays that extend for trillions of kilometers. These jets are responsible for creating the elaborate web of loops & swirls revealed in the image.

Today Chandra is studying M96, a spiral galaxy located about 35 million light years from Earth. The galaxy's core is not exactly at the galactic center and its spiral arms are asymmetrical — features likely caused by gravitational interaction with other galaxies nearby.

Today Chandra is gazing at #galaxies in Centaurus. Nearby in the sky is planetary nebula Fleming 1, a glowing cloud of gas around 2 white dwarf stars. In the next 10,000 years or so, Fleming 1 will slowly disperse into #space. The stars will cool & fade away for billions of years.

Today Chandra is peering into #Sagittarius. Nearby in the sky is the Lagoon Nebula, a rowdy stellar nursery located about 4,000 light years from #Earth. This image spans roughly 4 light years, and it features just a small portion of the whole Lagoon Nebula which is more than 55 light years across.

Chandra scientists have uncovered signs that Black Holes are demolishing thousands of stars and using their remains to pack on weight. This new survey of over 100 galaxies could help explain how intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) are made.

Today Chandra is studying the gargantuan #galaxy cluster Abell 2744. Galaxy clusters contain enormous amounts of superheated gas at temperatures of tens of millions of degrees — which glows brightly in X-ray light — and can be observed across millions of light years between galaxies. This image of the cluster spans roughly 6 million light years.