NASA's James Webb Telescope captures striking image of dwarf galaxy

Agencies | Washington                    

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com  

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope recently shared a spectacular image of the dwarf galaxy Wolf-Lundmark-Melotte (WLM). The image shows countless white stars within the dwarf gallery, which is about 3 million light-years from our galaxy, Milky Way and it is about one-tenth the size.

NASA said that WLM is considered a dwarf galaxy in our galactic neighbourhood. While it is close, it's much more isolated than other nearby galaxies, which interact with our own Milky Way. WLM also has a similar chemical makeup to galaxies in the early universe, meaning it's poor in elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. Because WLM is small and low-mass, supernovae (star explosion) events can be powerful and energetic enough to expel heavier elements out of the galaxy.

The Webb telescope used its near-infrared camera to capture stunning details. Kristen McQuinn of Rutgers University, one of the lead scientists on Webb Early Release Science in a post shared by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said, "We can see a myriad of individual stars of different colours, sizes, temperatures, ages, and stages of evolution; interesting clouds of nebular gas within the galaxy; foreground stars with Webb's diffraction spikes; and background galaxies with neat features like tidal tails."

"Countless white stars, interspersed with yellow and orange background galaxies of various shapes, dot the black background. One prominent galaxy is a pale yellow spiral in the top left corner of the image. Another defining feature is a large white star with long diffraction spikes, seen just to the right of the top centre," NASA described the image.

NASA also shared a video that shows past space observatory images.

Earlier, the Webb telescope captured an eerie, extremely dusty view of the Pillars of Creation in mid-infrared light. The expansive Eagle Nebula, which is 6,500 light-years away, is the location of The Pillars of Creation.