The James Webb Space Telescope has recently discovered massive new features at the dense center of the Milky Way, a turbulent region of space, as announced by NASA on Monday.
This extraordinary image showcases Sagittarius C, a star-forming area located about 300 light years from the supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A, at the core of the Milky Way. The image captures approximately 500,000 stars, including a group of protostars, which are in the process of forming. NASA describes these protostars as “glowing like a bonfire in the midst of an infrared-dark cloud.”
According to Samuel Crowe, principal investigator of the observation team, the James Webb Space Telescope has provided unprecedented infrared data that reveals never-before-seen details of the area, allowing for further study of star formation in such environments.
What’s in the new James Webb image?
One of the most notable findings in the new image is a protostar that is over 30 times the mass of the sun, making it a significant discovery for astronomers.
A dense cloud obstructs light from reaching Webb, creating the illusion of a less crowded space within the image than it actually is.
According to Rubén Fedriani, co-investigator of the project at the Instituto Astrofísica de Andalucía, Spain, there are turbulent, magnetized gas clouds forming stars, causing an impact on the surrounding gas with their outflowing winds, jets, and radiation.
NASA also discovered a previously unseen region of ionized hydrogen gas surrounding the dense dust cloud, featuring chaotic, needle-like structures orienting in many directions, which will be examined further in future studies.
Mr. Crowe added that it’s essential to understand the massive stars and their contribution to the production of heavy elements that make up a significant part of the universe’s origin.
What are scientists hoping to learn from the region of space?
Given that the region is about 25,000 light years away from Earth, its galactic center is close enough for astronomers to study individual stars with the help of the Webb telescope, offering unprecedented insights into how stars form.
“The galactic center is the most extreme environment in our Milky Way galaxy, where current theories of star formation can be put to their most rigorous test,” stated Jonathan Tan, a professor at the University of Virginia’s astronomy department and one of Crowe’s advisers.
