An exquisite photograph of the nebula 30 Doradus was taken by the James Webb Space Telescope. The dusty filaments that have been seen in earlier telescopic photos have given rise to the nebula's alternative name, the Tarantula Nebula.
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The Webb picture provides stunning clarity for astronomers interested in studying star formation, who have long sought out this stellar nursery as a prime study object. In addition to the distant background galaxies, Webb was able to record the intricate structure and chemical makeup of the nebula's gas and dust.
One of the biggest and brightest star-forming areas in the Local Group, the Tarantula Nebula lies over 161,000 light-years distant in the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy (Galaxies nearest to our own.) Some of the most massive and blazingly hot stars in the universe reside there as well. Astronomers sent three of Webb's high-resolution infrared sensors at the star-forming region to learn more about the region's extreme temperatures.
This area, as seen by the telescope's Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), resembles the silk-lined tunnel of a Tarantula spider. Radiation from a group of massive newborn stars, shown here as blue sparkles, has carved out a hole near the nebula's centre. All except the densest surrounding parts of the nebulae are eroded by the stars' tremendous stellar winds, generating pillars that seem to point towards the cluster. Protostars are now growing within these "pillars," and they will ultimately emerge and help shape the nebula.
When the Webb telescope's Mid-Infrared Instrument observes the same area in much longer infrared wavelengths, a quite different picture emerges (MIRI). MIRI's picture shows that the colder gas and dust appear to shine as the bright stars fade. Protostars are the bright dots in this picture, and they are still forming and acquiring mass. Shorter wavelengths of light are either absorbed or scattered by the dust particles in the nebula. However, the dust is transparent to the longer mid-infrared wavelengths, which depict a quite different cosmic scene.
When our universe was just a few billion years old, star creation activity reached its "cosmic noon." One of the main reasons for scientists' fascination with the Tarantula Nebula is that its chemical makeup is quite comparable to that of the massive star-forming areas discovered around this cosmic noon.
