James Webb Telescope Looks into the ‘Eye of God’ and Finds Clues to the Origin of Life — Space Photo of the Week

Stunning new images of the Helix Nebula captured by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) reveal the death throes of stars like our Sun, and perhaps a harbinger of the fate of our own solar system.

The Helix Nebula, also known as the “Eye of God” or “Eye of Sauron,” is one of the closest, most colorful, and best-studied planetary nebulae in the universe. This famous nearby starscape is destined for JWST’s near-infrared processing, revealing cosmic structures previously hinted at only by other space telescopes.

According to NASA, a planetary nebula is a somewhat confusing name for a cloud of gases (mainly hydrogen and helium) and microscopic cosmic dust that a dying Sun-like star releases as it sheds its outer layers. The star is a dense, hot white dwarf in the center of the cloud that ionizes the surrounding gas, causing it to glow in vivid colors. In this case, when viewed from the solar system, it has a spiral (or corkscrew-like) structure. (These bright, often circular nebulae resembled planets when viewed with early telescopes, hence their name.)

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Amidst this colorful spectacle, important processes are unfolding. The star’s former outer layer is now expanding into interstellar space, seeding the galaxy with carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen, the same elements that make life on Earth possible.

JWST used a near-infrared camera to penetrate deeper into the Helix Nebula than ever before. In this close-up of a small section of the nebula around a white dwarf, thousands of orange and gold comet-like columns stream upward. These features, technically called “comet knots,” separate the fast stellar winds from the dying star and from older, cooler layers of gas that were ejected early in its life.

The orange semicircle at the bottom, where the pillars are more densely packed, is the circumference of the shell. A black universe is floating in the sky, and some stars with a blue background can also be seen.

As is common in space telescope images, the filter reveals the nebula’s temperature and chemistry, which change with distance from the white dwarf. Near the star, the blue glow is produced by ultraviolet radiation that ignites hot ionized gas. The further away from the star, the lower the temperature, and farther out hydrogen molecules are marked by yellow and crimson dust.

Dust, the potential seeds for the next generation of stars and planets, is part of what makes this image so exciting. This image shows the life cycle of matter. Radiation and ejected material from a dying star creates regions where more complex molecules can survive and grow.

Beautiful as it may be, the Helix Nebula is the recycling center of the universe, a blueprint for what will eventually happen to the Sun in about 5 billion years when it expands into a red giant, sheds its outer layers, and leaves behind a white dwarf.

For more sublime space images, check out this week’s space photo archive.