Webb Image reveals a carbon molecule in a distant star system

The Webb Space Telescope recently stared at a gaseous region in the Orion Nebula and managed to detect a carbon-based molecule that could be a “keystone of interstellar organic chemistry,” according to the European Space Agency. launch.

The statement stated that the molecule had not been detected in space before. It is found in a system called d203-506, about 1,350 light-years from Earth. The system is surrounded by gas and dust and has a small red dwarf star — about one —One-tenth of the Sun’s mass – at its center. A preliminary version of the team’s research describing the discovery was published in nature.

The molecule is a methyl cation (CH3+), and although it doesn’t react efficiently with hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, it interacts a lot with other molecules. An ion is an atom or molecule with a net electric charge; A cation is a positively charged ion (hence the + in the name CH3+). Because of its unique properties, CH3+ is hypothesized to be an important building block of interstellar carbon chemistry.

This detection of CH3+ not only proves the amazing sensitivity of James Webb also underscores the putative centrality of CH3+ to interstellar chemistry, Marie-Aline Martin-Drumel, a spectroscopy scientist at Paris-Saclay University and co-author on the paper said in the ESA release.

A web image of the interstellar planetary disk system shows the power of the telescope. The telescope was launched in December 2021 and has been releasing scientific images since July 2022. The telescope images in infrared and near infrared wavelengths, allowing it to cut through gas and dust that can obscure many cosmic phenomena from the perspective of visible-light telescopes, such as Hubble. .

This makes Webb a unique tool for imaging particularly intimate events, such as hot spots of stellar birth that occur deep in gas and dusty clouds. The recently imaged disk is part of the Orion Nebula. You can see how The nebula looks different from Webb versus Hubble here.

Both old and new images of the nebula were taken as part of the PDRs4 All Scientific Collaborationswhich aims to image and analyze photodisintegration regions (PDRs), where ultraviolet radiation from stars creates warm regions of gas and dust.

The largest image of the region was taken by the Near Infrared Webcam, or NIRCam. Its image of the smaller area was taken by the mid-infrared instrument, or MIRI. The same system is shown in a composite image taken by both devices.

The end product is a great demonstration of what Webb can do: pluck out a single star system from a sweeping region of gas and dust. And while this system was relatively close, Webb could also look out into the ancient universe to see primordial galaxies, especially by using gravitational lensing to zoom in on distant light.

Webb also took his own images of the Pillars of Creation – the tendrils of the Eagle Nebula filled with gas and dust – and the difference between Hubble and Webb. A famous view of this structure equally stark.

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