NASA Reveals the James Webb Space Telescope’s First Coloured Images

NASA officials pulled back the veil on an exhibition of brilliant photographs taken by the largest and most powerful observatory ever flown to orbit on Tuesday, 12th July, following a US presidential sneak peek of a galaxy-studded image from the deep cosmos.

NASA celebrated the release of the first full-color, high-resolution images from the James Webb Space Telescope as a turning point in astronomical exploration. The telescope was created to see and observe the cosmos at a far greater distance.

The nearly 20-year-old, $9 billion infrared telescope, built by NASA by the aerospace behemoth Northrop Grumman Corp., was launched on Christmas, 2021. A month later, it arrived at its target in solar orbit, which is roughly 1 million miles away from Earth.

The Webb telescope is now in top shape and will be used to study, among other things, the evolution of galaxies, the life cycle of stars, the atmospheres of distant planetary systems, and the moons of our outer solar system. This was accomplished after months were spent remotely aligning Webb's mirrors and adjusting its instruments.

Approximately 300 scientists, telescope engineers, politicians, and senior officials from NASA and its international partners were welcomed into a jam-packed auditorium, buzzing with energy, at the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland for the big reveal with whoops and hollers from a lively "cheer team." NASA Administrator, James Nelson described the scene as a ‘pep rally’, deeming the telescope’s findings as a discovery each time.

The first set of images, which took weeks to produce from Webb's raw data, were chosen by NASA to highlight the telescope's potential and hint at upcoming science missions.

TThe most striking initial picture was a "deep field" image of the distant galaxy cluster (SMACS 0723), which provided the most comprehensive view of the early universe ever made. The Carina Nebula and the Southern Ring Nebula, two vast clouds of gas and dust thousands of light years distant from Earth that were launched into space by supernova explosions to form incubators for new stars, were among the four more Webb topics that received close-up views on Tuesday.

Moreover, the collection featured brand-new pictures of Stephan's Quintet, a galaxy cluster that was initially seen in 1877 and contains a number of galaxies that NASA described as being 'engaged in a cosmic dance'.

In addition to the imagery, NASA released Webb's first spectrographic examination of a Jupiter-sized planetary system more than 1,100 light years away, which showed the presence of water vapour in the atmosphere.

Webb is approximately 100 times more sensitive than its 30-year-old predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope, which mostly operates at optical and ultraviolet wavelengths. Webb was designed to view its subjects primarily in the infrared spectrum.

James Webb's advanced design allows it to observe objects at greater distances and consequently further back in time. Its infrared optics enable Webb's observations to pass through gas and dust clouds that block out visible light.