{"id":22539,"date":"2023-02-14T20:54:08","date_gmt":"2023-02-14T20:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/09ad0178-06b3-49ae-94d6-da8045519d8512"},"modified":"2023-02-14T20:54:08","modified_gmt":"2023-02-14T20:54:08","slug":"james-webb-telescope-captures-a-milky-way-like-galaxy-a-billion-light-years-away","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/james-webb-telescope-captures-a-milky-way-like-galaxy-a-billion-light-years-away\/","title":{"rendered":"James Webb telescope captures a Milky Way-like galaxy a billion light-years away"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>Astronomers at the European Space Agency (ESA) used the <span class=\"waslinkname\">James Webb Space Telescope<\/span> to capture an image of a spiral galaxy that resembles our home, the Milky Way. The star system, LEDA 2046648, sits a billion light-years away from ours in the constellation Hercules; it contains thousands of galaxies, trillions of stars and countless planets.<\/p>\n<p>The ESA <span class=\"waslinkname\">released<\/span> the picture on January 31 (<span class=\"waslinkname\">highlighted<\/span> this week by <em>The NY Times<\/em>). The space agency described it as a mere calibration image to \u201cverify the telescope\u2019s capabilities as it was prepared for science operations.\u201d ESA astronomers snapped it on May 22, 2022, with the Webb telescope\u2019s Near InfraRed Camera (NIRCam).<\/p>\n<p><span id=\"end-legacy-contents\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>That ultra-powerful camera can detect longer infrared wavelengths produced by light from this far away. Redshifting describes the stretching of light\u2019s wavelength as it moves away from us, increasing until it appears redder than expected. It occurs because of the universe\u2019s expansion: Distant systems like LEDA 2046648 keep moving farther from Earth.<\/p>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/james-webb-telescope-captures-a-milky-way-like-galaxy-a-billion-light-years-away.webp\" alt=\"Image that was taken with the James Webb Space Telescope showing a spiral galaxy at the bottom center, surrounded by more distant galaxies (appearing as blobs) and individual stars.\" data-uuid=\"fc5dab32-0dca-3030-9d7d-fa8041b57364\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><\/figcaption><p>European Space Agency<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Most of the visible blobs surrounding LEDA 2046648 are also galaxies, although several stars can be discerned by their diffraction spike patterns. Some objects in the image could be as old as 300 million years after the Big Bang. Of course, an image of anything one billion light-years away means we\u2019re viewing the galaxy\u2019s light from a billion years ago. So astronomers are eager to study early galaxies like this one (and <span class=\"waslinkname\">even older ones<\/span>) to help clarify the types of stars that condensed out of the Big Bang \u2014 and how supermassive black holes ended up in most galaxies\u2019 centers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><em>All products recommended by Engadget are selected by our editorial team, independent of our parent company. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. All prices are correct at the time of publishing.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Astronomers at the European Space Agency (ESA) used the James Webb Space Telescope to capture an image of a spiral galaxy that resembles our home, the Milky Way. The star system, LEDA 2046648, sits a billion light-years away from ours in the constellation Hercules; it contains thousands of galaxies, trillions of stars and countless planets. &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22540,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22539"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22539"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22539\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22539"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.worldtechguide.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=22539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}