Many of the circled objects represent previously unknown supernovae.
Collaboration between NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI and JADES
Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have discovered a surprising number of supernovae in the distant universe, including some of the most distant yet seen. Their discoveries increase the number of known supernovae in the early universe by a factor of ten.
The researchers imaged the same small patch of sky twice, in 2022 and 2023, and found 79 new supernovae. “It’s actually very small, about the size of a grain of rice held at arm’s length,” the researchers said. Christa DeCourcy “We’ve spent more than 100 hours on JWST,” said Dr. [observing] I took my time with each image, which gives them a lot of depth.”
Astronomers then compared the two images with each other and with previous photos of the same area taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, looking for bright spots that appear in one image but not the other.
These specks are relatively faint stars that shone brightly before fading in bright supernova explosions. Some of them are candidates for the most distant supernovae ever found, although their distances have yet to be confirmed. And one of them is definitely the most distant yet confirmed. This star exploded when the universe was only about 1.8 billion years old.
Such supernovae would have produced the heavy elements that are now widespread throughout the universe, so they would have had lower concentrations of these elements than modern supernovae. “The universe at this early stage was fundamentally different from what has been explored in the past by the Hubble Space Telescope and especially ground-based surveys,” he said. Justin Pierre “This is really new territory that JWST is breaking into,” he said during a presentation at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Maryland, where observations could help shed light on what the first stars were like.
topic:
- Performer/
- James Webb Space Telescope
