Hubble 28th Anniversary Image in Infrared Shows Promise of Webb Telescope
This star-filled image, taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in near-infrared wavelengths of light, reveals a very different view of the Lagoon Nebula compared to its visible-light portrait. Making infrared observations of the cosmos allows astronomers to penetrate vast clouds of gas and dust to uncover hidden gems. Hubble’s view offers a sneak peek at the dramatic vistas NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope will provide.
The most obvious difference between Hubble’s infrared and visible photos of this region is the abundance of stars that fill the infrared field of view. Most of them are more distant, background stars located behind the nebula itself. However, some of these pinpricks of light are young stars within the Lagoon Nebula. The brilliant star near the center of the frame, known as Herschel 36, is about 200,000 times brighter than our Sun.
This hefty star is 32 times more massive and eight times hotter than our Sun. Its powerful ultraviolet radiation and fierce stellar winds are carving away the surrounding nebula, removing the raw materials that smaller stars need to form. Dark smudges known as Bok globules mark the thickest parts of the nebula, where dust protects still-forming stars and their planets. While Hubble cannot penetrate these dusty clumps, Webb will be able to see through them.
Webb will probe young stars still in the process of forming. It also will examine the disks of dust and gas surrounding those stars, known as protoplanetary disks, in order to determine how far the planet formation process has proceeded. Webb will determine whether the inner regions of those disks have been cleared out, the dust either swept up by protoplanets or swept away by stellar winds.
Webb could take a stellar census of the Lagoon Nebula to determine not only how many massive stars it contains, but also how many Sun-like stars and how many failed stars known as brown dwarfs. This would enable astronomers to get the big picture of the stellar population across the entire range of masses, particularly at the low end.
The image shows a region of the nebula measuring about 4 light-years across. The observations were taken by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 between Feb. 12 and Feb. 18, 2018.
Credits
NASA, ESA, and STScI| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | Lagoon Nebula (Messier 8) |
| Object Description | Emission Nebula |
| R.A. Position | 18:03:37.0 |
| Dec. Position | -24:23:12.0 |
| Constellation | Sagittarius |
| Distance | The nebula is located 4,000 light-years away from Earth. |
| Dimensions | Image is 3.5 arcmin across (about 4 light-years). |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | The HST observations include those from program (M.Mutchler/STScI) |
| Instrument | WFC3/IR |
| Exposure Dates | 12-18 February 2018 |
| Filters | F125W, F160W |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | These images are a composite of separate exposures acquired by the WFC3 instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope. Several filters were used to sample narrow wavelength ranges. The color results from assigning different hues (colors) to each monochromatic (grayscale) image associated with an individual filter. In this case, the assigned colors are: Cyan: F125W Orange: F160W |
| Compass Image |  |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
