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    Lazy Llama

James Webb: A $10bn machine in search of the end of darkness

editor said:
Far distant space is just too huge for me to get my head around. And frustrating to know I'll never get to visit any of these wonderful worlds.
Click to expand...
Each of those smears of light will be something like many billions, or more, of stars each, so perhaps somewhere between 10^10 to 10^12 sizeable planets in each, and maybe something like 1000 galaxies in that image, so could be getting on for a quadrillion worlds.
 
Pretty astonishing that the original Hubble Deep Field back in 1995 took years of tweaks and fixes - and then ten days' worth of exposures - to produce the image, and then the James Webb is able to chuck this one out after a matter of weeks (total exposure time was apparently a mere 12.5hrs).

Nicely done, NASA :thumbs:

Incidentally, wikipedia has this nifty little diagram from 2011 indicating how deep they think JWST might be able to go in comparison to other telescopes - as far back as 200MYa after the big bang if we're lucky, IIRC the oldest object observed in this current image is already 300MYa after the big bang.
Deepfieldscomparison.jpg
 
That cluster of galaxies above is about 5 billion light years away, whilst the distorted, gravitationally lensed galaxies that are behind that are anything up to perhaps around 13 billion years in the past (need to take spectra to determine). It won't 'see' as far back as eg Planck (just under 400,000 years after the Big Bang, z~1000; different wavelengths needed).

A couple of HST/JWST side-by-side comparisons of the same field and a comparable crop of a pair of objects from the top of that wider field (near the 12 o'clock position):
HSTJWST​
HSTJWST​
The overexposed foreground stars exhibit multiple diffraction spikes due to the secondary mirror support arms [F] (the two less prominent horizontal spikes plus four more minor diagonals) and the segmented hex mirror configuration [6a] (the six diagonal and vertical spikes):
JWST configuration: F+6aright arrowJWST configuration and resulting diffraction pattern.​
e2a: Also worth noting that the JWST exposure was just a few hours whereas each of the HST deep fields have taken tens of days to integrate.
 
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If you fancy a tour of those overexposed foreground stars (just to get some idea of distance scales and the jumps in imaging technology)...
​
 
Ages for the background, early universe galaxies in the first image, determined from their IR spectra. The oldest perhaps imaged within the first billion (or less) years of the universe.
JWST spectra identifying some of the earliest galaxies in the universe.
 
And it's not only distant galaxies we're seeing for the first time, either. The telescope has been able to detect water on an extro-planet 1,150 light years away!

www.nasa.gov

NASA’s Webb Reveals Steamy Atmosphere of Distant Planet in Detail - NASA

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captured the most detailed measurements of starlight filtering through the atmosphere of a planet outside our solar system to date. Distinct water signatures were observed, as was evidence of haze and clouds that previous studies did not detect.
www.nasa.gov www.nasa.gov
 
T & P said:
And it's not only distant galaxies we're seeing for the first time, either. The telescope has been able to detect water on an extro-planet 1,150 light years away!

www.nasa.gov

NASA’s Webb Reveals Steamy Atmosphere of Distant Planet in Detail - NASA

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captured the most detailed measurements of starlight filtering through the atmosphere of a planet outside our solar system to date. Distinct water signatures were observed, as was evidence of haze and clouds that previous studies did not detect.
www.nasa.gov www.nasa.gov
Click to expand...
Well, steam ;)
 
T & P said:
And it's not only distant galaxies we're seeing for the first time, either. The telescope has been able to detect water on an extro-planet 1,150 light years away!

www.nasa.gov

NASA’s Webb Reveals Steamy Atmosphere of Distant Planet in Detail - NASA

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captured the most detailed measurements of starlight filtering through the atmosphere of a planet outside our solar system to date. Distinct water signatures were observed, as was evidence of haze and clouds that previous studies did not detect.
www.nasa.gov www.nasa.gov
Click to expand...
Water has been seen in many exoplanet atmospheres before (eg other WASP imaged by HST). What is interesting here is evidence in the transmission spectrum profile for cloud structures and haze.
 
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They're all great images but the Stephan's Quintet image is amazing.

If life does exist elsewhere, and in one of those 4 galaxies - I don't even know how or what question to ask in the sense of would they be aware? Andromeda and our own Milky Way are due to collide aren't they? if mankind is still around when would it affect us/destroy us?
 
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