A first -- NASA shows galaxies as they appeared 4.6 billion years ago

Aditi Tandon

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New Delhi, July 12

The deepest, sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date is now out there for the world to see and savour. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, the world’s premier space science observatory set up to solve mysteries of the solar system, has produced this image that shows a galaxy cluster as it appeared 4.6 billion years ago.

Known as Webb’s “First Deep Field”, the image of the galaxy cluster is overflowing with detail and was released late on Monday by US President Joe Biden.

“Thousands of galaxies – including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared – have appeared in Webb’s view for the first time. This slice of the vast universe covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length by someone on the ground. This deep field, taken by Webb’s near-infrared camera is a composite made from images at different wavelengths, totalling 12.5 hours – achieving depths at infrared wavelengths beyond the Hubble Space Telescope’s deepest fields, which took weeks,” NASA said on Tuesday marking the historic day.

In partnership with European Space Agency and Canadian Space Agency, NASA, starting today, will release the full set of Webb’s first full-color images and spectroscopic data in a televised broadcast from its Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

Webb’s near-infrared camera has, in a first, managed to bring distant galaxies into sharp focus – they have tiny, faint structures that have never been seen before, including star clusters and diffuse features.

What this means is researchers will soon begin to learn more about the galaxies’ masses, ages, histories, and compositions, as Webb seeks the earliest galaxies in the universe.

Former DG, CSIR Raghunath Mashelkar hailed the occasion as a breakthrough moment in science.

“Today, we have been able to see objects as they existed 4.6 billion years ago. The Big Bang was 13.6 billion years ago. With more studies we will be able to reach the origins of the universe,” Mashelkar told The Tribune.

Astrophysicists worldwide are excited.

Back home, Yashwant Gupta, Director, National Centre for Radio Astrophysics, Pune, said Webb Telescope will allow us to look much further back in the universe when the first stars and galaxies were formed.

“This means we will be able to explore the universe at its earliest time. Today, Webb has shown us galaxies as they appeared 4.6 billion years ago. This means that the radiation we are seeing in these objects started its journey 4.6 billion years ago for us to see it today,” Gupta explained.

Asked what the Webb Telescope does that the currently powerful Hubble telescope does not, Gupta said the Hubble telescope followed the optical window which we see with the normal eye and optical radiation gets blocked by the dust between us and the faraway objects in the universe, producing very hazy pictures.

“Webb’s infrared radiation largely overcomes the limitation of dust and produces sharper, deeper images. It is like getting a new pair of spectacles and seeing everything crystal clearly,” Gupta said.