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Dive into the cradle of the stars... That’s what researchers have just captured with the James Webb Space Telescope: the most detailed and sharpest images ever taken of the inner region of the Orion Nebula. These observations were made possible and confirmed by Webb’s revolutionary capabilities.
Located in the constellation of Orion, 1350 light-years from Earth, the Orion Nebula is an area rich in material where many stars are formed. It would be an environment similar to the one where our system was born more than 4.5 billion years ago: studying it allows us to better understand the conditions prevailing at that time.
The heart of a stellar nursery, like the Orion Nebula, is obscured by large amounts of dust. It is impossible to observe it in visible light with telescopes like Hubble. The James Webb Space Telescope observes the infrared light of the cosmos, and thus allows us to see through these layers of dust. It finally lifts the veil on what is going on in the depths of the nebula.
It first reveals many spectacular structures, up to scales of about 40 AU1. Among them, a number of dense filaments of matter, which could favor the birth of a new generation of stars, as well as stellar systems in formation have been observed. The latter consist of a central protostar surrounded by a disk of dust and gas inside which planets are forming.
The Orion Nebula also harbors a cluster of massive young stars, called the Trapezium cluster, emitting intense ultraviolet radiation, capable of shaping the dust and gas clouds. Understanding how this phenomenon influences the environment is a key question for studying the formation of stellar systems like our own Solar System.
These results are the result of one of the James Webb priority observing programs, which involved about 100 scientists in 18 countries2 and was co-led by scientists from CNRS, Université Paris-Saclay and the University of Western Ontario (located in London, Canada). These programs were selected in an international call for proposals from the James Webb Space Telescope.
The research team is working to analyze the data collected about the Orion Nebula, and promises new discoveries about the early phases of the formation of stellar and planetary systems.
Notes
1- For Astronomical Unit. One AU corresponds approximately to the distance between the Earth and the Sun, 10 AU corresponds to the distance between Saturn and the Sun.
2- In France, this research involved scientists from the Institut de recherche en astrophysique et planétologie (CNRS/CNES/UT3 Paul Sabatier), from the Institut d’astrophysique spatiale (CNRS/Université Paris-Saclay) the Laboratoire d’études du rayonnement et de la matière en astrophysique et atmosphères (Observatoire de Paris - PSL/CNRS/Sorbonne Université/Université de Cergy-Pontoise), the Institut des sciences moléculaires d’Orsay (CNRS/Université Paris-Saclay), the Institut de planétologie et d’astrophysique de Grenoble (CNRS/UGA) the Laboratoire de physique de l’École normale supérieure (CNRS/ENS-PSL/Sorbonne University/Université Paris Cité), the Laboratoire de physique des deux infinis Irène Joliot-Curie (CNRS/Université Paris Saclay), the Institut de physique de Rennes(CNRS/Université de Rennes 1), the Institut d’astrophysique de Paris (CNRS/Sorbonne University), the Astrophysics, Instrumentation, Modeling Laboratory (CNRS/CEA/Université Paris Cité), the Institute of Molecular Sciences (CNRS/Institut polytechnique de Bordeaux/Université de Bordeaux), and the Laboratory of Quantum Chemistry and Physics (CNRS/UT3 Paul Sabatier)
This image was obtained with the NIRCam instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope on September 11, 2022. Several images in different filters were combined to create this composite image: F140M and F210M (blue); F277W, F300M, F323N, F335M, and F332W (green); F405N (orange); and F444W, F480M and F470N (red).
This is a composite image from several filters that represents emission from ionized gas, hydrocarbons, molecular gas, dust and scattered starlight. Most prominent is the Orion Bar, a wall of dense gas and dust that runs from the top left to the bottom right in this image, and that contains the bright star θ2 Orionis A. The scene is illuminated by a group of hot, young massive stars (known as the Trapezium Cluster) which is located just off the top right of the image. The strong and harsh ultraviolet radiation of the Trapezium cluster creates a hot, ionized environment in the upper right, and slowly erodes the Orion Bar away. Molecules and dust can survive longer in the shielded environment offered by the dense Bar, but the surge of stellar energy sculpts a region that displays an incredible richness of filaments, globules, young stars with disks and cavities.
Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, Data reduction and analysis : PDRs4All ERS Team; graphical processing S. Fuenmayor
Technical details: The image was obtained with the James Webb Space Telescope NIRCam instrument on September 11, 2022. Several images in different filters were combined to create this composite image: F140M and F210M (blue); F277W, F300M, F323N, F335M, and F332W (green); F405N (orange); and F444W, F480M, and F470N (red).
Young star with disk inside its cocoon: Planet forming disks of gas and dust around a young star. These disks are being dissipated or “photo-evaporated” due to the strong radiation field of the nearby stars of the Trapezium creating a cocoon of dust and gas around them. Almost 180 of these externally illuminated photoevaporating disks around young stars (aka Proplyds) have been discovered in the Orion nebula, and HST-10 (the one in the picture) is one of the largest known. The orbit of Neptune is shown for comparison.
Filaments: The entire image is rich in filaments of different sizes and shapes. The inset here shows thin, meandering filaments that are especially rich in hydrocarbon molecules and molecular hydrogen.
θ2 Orionis A: The brightest star in this image is θ2 Orionis A, a star that is just bright enough to be seen with the naked eye from a dark location on Earth. Stellar light that is reflecting off dust grains causes the red glow in its immediate surroundings.
Young star inside globule: When dense clouds of gas and dust become gravitationally unstable, they collapse into stellar embryos that gradually grow more massive until they can start nuclear fusion in their core – they start to shine. This young star is still embedded in its natal cloud.
