![]() ![]() "Every time there's a supernova explosion, it's producing the raw materials for life: the iron in our blood, the calcium in our bones, the oxygen that we breathe," Milisavljevic said. Webb reveals unprecedented detail at the centers of these explosions, Milisavljevic said. Purdue University astronomer Dan Milisavljevic studies exploded stars, which were the furnaces that forged the first heavy elements from a cosmos of simple helium and hydrogen. Some of the discoveries leave even the experts starstruck. "It is a great honor and it does blow your mind every time," Pagan said. Pagan and Depasquale are among the first people in history to see the images of the cosmic discoveries captured by Webb. Since Webb captures infrared light, which is invisible to the human eyes, Alyssa Pagan and Joe Depasquale follow a scientifically rigorous method of taking data from Webb and matching it with wavelengths people can see to make the awe-inspiring images released to the public. The telescope has also shown previously unseen stars and intricate detail in towering clouds of gas known as the "Pillars of Creation." It's been used to get extremely detailed images of thousands of never-before-seen young stars in a region known as the Tarantula Nebula. Webb has captured a direct image of a planet located outside of our solar system. The powerful $10 billion telescope, 25 years in the making, is considered the successor to the 32-year-old Hubble. Webb's primary mission is to reveal the "let there be light," moment when the stars and galaxies first ignited after the Big Bang. We now have to say, 'Look up at the night sky and there are galaxies everywhere.'" We knew this theoretically, but when you go out to the night sky, we're used to saying, 'Well, look up at the night sky, we see those stars.' We can no longer say that. "It tells us that our universe is filled with galaxies. In the background are galaxies again," Mountain said. ![]() You know, it was just this beautiful orb just sitting there and we saw some rings. I mean, we took a simple picture of a planet in our own system, Neptune. "On almost every image we're taking now, we see galaxies everywhere. With Webb, Mountain says, "there is no empty sky." Matt Mountain, who manages Webb's operations for NASA as the president of AURA, believes the observatory may last up to 25 years. Webb will make even more discoveries over the coming years. NASA, SkyWorks Digital, Northrop Grumman, STScI "Because that means that we have to revise our understanding of the universe." James Webb Space Telescope "And that's the most exciting piece of this, of this telescope, of this remarkable instrument we put in space, is finding things that we didn't expect, that we can't explain," she said. More observations are needed, but Nelson says that, if confirmed, the discovery would break the theory of how the early universe formed. "Either this is wrong or this is a huge discovery, and we think that it's a huge discovery," Nelson said. ![]()
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