CfA Scientists Play Important Role in New NASA Mission

This artist's impression of SPHEREx shows the spacecraft as it will appear when in low-Earth orbit. During its 27-month nominal mission, SPHEREx will conduct four all-sky surveys to study the early history of the cosmos and search for interstellar molecules such as water and other compounds thought to be precursors of life as we know it.  Credit: NASA/JPLM High Resolution Image

A new NASA mission with major roles from scientists at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA) will help answer questions about why the large scale structure of the Universe looks the way it does today, how galaxies form and evolve, and what are the abundances of water and other key ingredients for life in our Galaxy.

SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization, and Ices Explorer) will identify specific atoms and molecules in millions of objects across space using their unique signatures in optical and infrared spectra, which show how their light depends on wavelength.

After its launch into space on March 11, 2025 from the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, SPHEREx will survey the entire sky four times over its 25-month mission. Astronomers will be able to combine SPHEREx’s ability to scan large sections of the sky quickly with more targeted studies Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) from ground-based telescopes and others in space like NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).

The CfA will lead the investigation into the abundances and distributions of molecules that are vital for life. Specifically, SPHEREx will conduct a survey along almost 10 million lines of sight in the Milky Way and the Magellanic Clouds, neighboring galaxies to our own. This survey will reveal crucial life-enabling molecules like water (H₂O), carbon monoxide (CO), and carbon dioxide (CO₂) in their icy states on the surfaces of interstellar dust grains.

These data will enable CfA scientists to evaluate the ice content in each direction and will help to trace the evolution of these ices as they transition from molecular clouds to planet-forming disks and, ultimately, to newly forming planets.  JWST can follow up the most interesting targets identified by SPHEREx, making the two facilities a particularly powerful combination for studying how Solar System planets as well as planets around other stars get their key ingredients for life.

The CfA SPHEREx team is led by Dr.Gary Melnick and includes Drs. Matthew Ashby, Joseph Hora, and Volker Tolls, who are joined by visiting scientist, Dr. Jaeyeong Kim, from the Korean Astronomy and Space Science Institute.

SPHEREx’ data will be freely available to scientists around the world, providing new information about hundreds of millions of cosmic objects. More about SPHEREx at the CfA can be found at https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/facilities-technology/telescopes-instruments/spherex

Source: Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA)/News

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Investigating Neutron Star Evolution

An artist's impression of a neutron-star X-ray binary accreting from its companion star and powering a jet.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (SSC)
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Over the past week, NuSTAR has conducted an intensive observing campaign on the neutron star X-ray binary GX 340+0, in coordination with the Australian Telescope Compact Array (ATCA, radio) and the X-ray Telescope aboard NASA’s Gehrels-Swift observatory. This well-known system belongs to the so-called "Z-source" family – a group of bright, accreting neutron stars that persistently trace a distinctive "Z-shaped" pattern in diagrams of their X-ray "hardness" (or color) plotted against their X-ray intensity. As these systems move back and forth along this Z-shaped track, typically over a timescale of about a week, their X-ray spectral and timing properties undergo a clear evolution. However, this evolution is significantly less pronounced compared to most other X-ray binaries, whether they contain neutron stars or black holes as the central accreting object. Interestingly, despite the relatively subtle changes in their X-ray properties, the radio emission from Z-sources has been observed to vary dramatically depending on their position along the Z-track. This suggests that the physical properties of their radio jets evolve far more than the underlying accretion flow. This behavior is unexpected, as such dramatic jet evolution is typically accompanied by equally dramatic changes in X-ray spectral-timing properties – especially in black hole systems. This discrepancy raises the possibility of different jet-launching mechanisms, distinct physical conditions, and/or unique correlations between jets and accretion flows in neutron star versus black hole X-ray binaries. To investigate this intriguing scenario, six simultaneous NuSTAR and ATCA observations were coordinated with a near-daily cadence over the course of a week. This observing strategy will, for the first time, track the co-evolution of the jet (radio) and accretion flow (X-rays) in this system, providing unique and unprecedented insights into the factors that govern jet evolution in Z-sources.

Authors: Alessio Marino (Postdoctoral fellow, ICE-CSIC, Spain)

Source: NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR)/News

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Famed WR 104 “Pinwheel” Star Reveals Another Surprise (and Some Relief)

An artist’s concept of the famous Wolf-Rayet 104 “pinwheel star,” previously nicknamed the “Death Star.” New research conducted from Maunakea, Hawaiʻi using three Keck Observatory instruments reveals the orbit of the two stars are angled 30 or 40 degrees away from us, sparing Earth from a potential gamma-ray burst (GRB). Credit: W. M. Keck Observatory/Adam Makarenko

An artist’s animation of WR 104, first discovered at Keck Observatory in 1999. It consists of two stars orbiting each other; a Wolf-Rayet star that produces a powerful, carbon-rich wind (depicted in yellow), and an OB star that creates a wind mostly made of hydrogen (depicted in blue). When the winds collide, they whip up a hydrocarbon “dust” spiral. Credit: W. M. Keck Observatory/Adam Makarenko

An infrared image of WR 104 captured by Keck Observatory’s NIRC instrument in 1998
Credit: U.C. Berkeley Space Sciences Laboratory/W. M. Keck Observatory

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A new spin on decades of W. M. Keck Observatory research

Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – A recent study reveals the famous Wolf-Rayet 104 “pinwheel star” holds more mystery but is even less likely to be the potential ‘Death Star’ it was once thought to be.

Research by W. M. Keck Observatory Instrument Scientist and astronomer Grant Hill finally confirms what has been suspected for years: WR 104 has at its heart a pair of massive stars orbiting each other with a period of about 8 months and the collision between their powerful winds gives rise to its rotating pinwheel of dust that glows in the infrared, and spins with the same period.

The pinwheel structure of WR 104 was discovered at Keck Observatory in 1999 and the remarkable images of it turning in the sky astonished astronomers. One of the two stars that were suspected to orbit each other – a Wolf-Rayet star– is a massive, evolved star that produces a powerful wind highly enriched with carbon. The second star – a less evolved but even more massive OB star – has a strong wind that is still mostly hydrogen. Collisions between winds like these are thought to allow hydrocarbons to form, often referred to as “dust” by astronomers. When discovered, WR 104 also made headlines as a potential gamma-ray burst (GRB) that could be aimed right at us. Models of the pinwheel images indicated it was rotating in the plane of the sky as if we were looking directly down on someone spinning a streaming garden hose over their head. That could mean the rotational poles of the two stars might be pointed in our direction as well. When one of the stars ends its life as a supernova the explosion might be energetic enough to create a GRB that would beam in the polar directions. Since it is located right here in our own Galaxy, and seemed to be aimed right at us, at the time, WR 104 gained a second nickname – the ‘Death Star’.

Hill’s research, published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, is based on spectroscopy using three of Keck Observatory’s instruments – the Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS), the Echellette Spectrograph and Imager (ESI), and the Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSPEC). With these spectra, he was able to measure velocities for the two stars, calculate their orbit and identify features in the spectra arising from the colliding winds. There turned out to be a very big surprise in store though.

“Our view of the pinwheel dust spiral from Earth absolutely looks face-on (spinning in the plane of the sky), and it seemed like a pretty safe assumption that the two stars are orbiting the same way” says Hill. “When I started this project, I thought the main focus would be the colliding winds and a face-on orbit was a given. Instead, I found something very unexpected. The orbit is tilted at least 30 or 40 degrees out of the plane of the sky.”

While a relief for those worried about a nearby GRB pointed right at us, this represents a real curveball. How can the dust spiral and the orbit be tilted so much to each other? Are there more physics that needs to be considered when modelling the formation of the dust plume?

“This is such a great example of how with astronomy we often begin a study and the universe surprises us with mysteries we didn’t expect” muses Hill. “We may answer some questions but create more. In the end, that is sometimes how we learn more about physics and the universe we live in. In this case, WR 104 is not done surprising us yet!”

Source: W.M. Keck ObservatoryScience News

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About NIRSPEC

The Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSPEC) is a unique, cross-dispersed echelle spectrograph that captures spectra of objects over a large range of infrared wavelengths at high spectral resolution. Built at the UCLA Infrared Laboratory by a team led by Prof. Ian McLean, the instrument is used for radial velocity studies of cool stars, abundance measurements of stars and their environs, planetary science, and many other scientific programs. A second mode provides low spectral resolution but high sensitivity and is popular for studies of distant galaxies and very cool low-mass stars. NIRSPEC can also be used with Keck II’s adaptive optics (AO)system to combine the powers of the high spatial resolution of AO with the high spectral resolution of NIRSPEC. Support for this project was provided by the Heising-Simons Foundation.

About LRIS

The Low Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (LRIS) is a very versatile and ultra-sensitive visible-wavelength imager and spectrograph built at the California Institute of Technology by a team led by Prof. Bev Oke and Prof. Judy Cohen and commissioned in 1993. Since then it has seen two major upgrades to further enhance its capabilities: the addition of a second, blue arm optimized for shorter wavelengths of light and the installation of detectors that are much more sensitive at the longest (red) wavelengths. Each arm is optimized for the wavelengths it covers. This large range of wavelength coverage, combined with the instrument’s high sensitivity, allows the study of everything from comets (which have interesting features in the ultraviolet part of the spectrum), to the blue light from star formation, to the red light of very distant objects. LRIS also records the spectra of up to 50 objects simultaneously, especially useful for studies of clusters of galaxies in the most distant reaches, and earliest times, of the universe. LRIS was used in observing distant supernovae by astronomers who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2011 for research determining that the universe was speeding up in its expansion

About ESI

The Echellette Spectrograph and Imager (ESI) is a medium-resolution visible-light spectrograph that records spectra from 0.39 to 1.1 microns in each exposure. Built at UCO/Lick Observatory by a team led by Prof. Joe Miller, ESI also has a low-resolution mode and can image in a 2 x 8 arc min field of view. An upgrade provided an integral field unit that can provide spectra everywhere across a small, 5.7 x4.0 arc sec field. Astronomers have found a number of uses for ESI, from observing the cosmological effects of weak gravitational lensing to searching for the most metal-poor stars in our galaxy.

About W. M. KECK OBSERVATORY

The W. M. Keck Observatory telescopes are among the most scientifically productive on Earth. The two 10-meter optical/infrared telescopes atop Maunakea on the Island of Hawaii feature a suite of advanced instruments including imagers, multi-object spectrographs, high-resolution spectrographs, integral-field spectrometers, and world-leading laser guide star adaptive optics systems. Some of the data presented herein were obtained at Keck Observatory, which is a private 501(c) 3 non-profit organization operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W. M. Keck Foundation. The authors wish to recognize and acknowledge the very significant cultural role and reverence that the summit of Maunakea has always had within the Native Hawaiian community. We are most fortunate to have the opportunity to conduct observations from this mountain. For more information, visit: www.keckobservatory.org

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NASA's Webb Sees Galaxy Mysteriously Clearing Fog of Early Universe

JADES-GS-z13-1 in the GOODS-S field (NIRCam Image)

Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, Brant Robertson (UC Santa Cruz), Ben Johnson (CfA), Sandro Tacchella (Cambridge), Phill Cargile (CfA), Joris Witstok (Cambridge, University of Copenhagen), P. Jakobsen (University of Copenhagen), Alyssa Pagan (STScI), Mahdi Zamani (ESA/Webb), JADES Collaboration

JADES-GS-z13-1 (NIRCam Close-Up)

Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, Brant Robertson (UC Santa Cruz), Ben Johnson (CfA), Sandro Tacchella (Cambridge), Phill Cargile (CfA), Joris Witstok (Cambridge, University of Copenhagen), P. Jakobsen (University of Copenhagen), Alyssa Pagan (STScI), Mahdi Zamani (ESA/Webb), JADES Collaboration

JADES-GS-z13-1 Spectrum Graphic

Credits/Illustration: NASA, ESA, CSA, S. Carniani (Scuola Normale Superiore), P. Jakobsen (University of Copenhagen), Joseph Olmsted (STScI)

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Using the unique infrared sensitivity of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, researchers can examine ancient galaxies to probe secrets of the early universe. Now, an international team of astronomers has identified bright hydrogen emission from a galaxy in an unexpectedly early time in the universe’s history. The surprise finding is challenging researchers to explain how this light could have pierced the thick fog of neutral hydrogen that filled space at that time.

The Webb telescope discovered the incredibly distant galaxy JADES-GS-z13-1, observed to exist just 330 million years after the big bang, in images taken by Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) as part of the James Webb Space Telescope Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES). Researchers used the galaxy’s brightness in different infrared filters to estimate its redshift, which measures a galaxy’s distance from Earth based on how its light has been stretched out during its journey through expanding space.

The NIRCam imaging yielded an initial redshift estimate of 12.9. Seeking to confirm its extreme redshift, an international team lead by Joris Witstok of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom as well as the Cosmic Dawn Center and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, then observed the galaxy using Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) instrument. In the resulting spectrum the redshift was confirmed to be 13.0. This equates to a galaxy seen just 330 million years after the big bang, a small fraction of the universe’s present age of 13.8 billion years old. But an unexpected feature stood out as well: one specific, distinctly bright wavelength of light, known as Lyman-alpha emission radiated by hydrogen atoms. This emission was far stronger than astronomers thought possible at this early stage in the universe’s development.

“The early universe was bathed in a thick fog of neutral hydrogen," explained Roberto Maiolino, a team member from the University of Cambridge and University College London. "Most of this haze was lifted in a process called reionization, which was completed about one billion years after the big bang. GS-z13-1 is seen when the universe was only 330 million years old, yet it shows a surprisingly clear, telltale signature of Lyman-alpha emission that can only be seen once the surrounding fog has fully lifted. This result was totally unexpected by theories of early galaxy formation and has caught astronomers by surprise.”

Before and during the era of reionization, the immense amounts of neutral hydrogen fog surrounding galaxies blocked any energetic ultraviolet light they emitted, much like the filtering effect of colored glass. Until enough stars had formed and were able to ionize the hydrogen gas, no such light — including Lyman-alpha emission — could escape from these fledgling galaxies to reach Earth. The confirmation of Lyman-alpha radiation from this galaxy, therefore, has great implications for our understanding of the early universe.

“We really shouldn’t have found a galaxy like this, given our understanding of the way the universe has evolved," said Kevin Hainline, a team member from the University of Arizona. "We could think of the early universe as shrouded with a thick fog that would make it exceedingly difficult to find even powerful lighthouses peeking through, yet here we see the beam of light from this galaxy piercing the veil. This fascinating emission line has huge ramifications for how and when the universe reionized.”

The source of the Lyman-alpha radiation from this galaxy is not yet known, but may include the first light from the earliest generation of stars to form in the universe. “The large bubble of ionized hydrogen surrounding this galaxy might have been created by a peculiar population of stars — much more massive, hotter and more luminous than stars formed at later epochs, and possibly representative of the first generation of stars," said Witstok. A powerful active galactic nucleus, driven by one of the first supermassive black holes, is another possibility identified by the team.

This research was published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

Source: NASA's James Webb Space Telescope/News

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Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Maryland

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• The science paper by J. Witstok et al.

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NASA's Webb Captures Neptune's Auroras For First Time

Neptune Auroras (Hubble and Webb Image)

Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Heidi Hammel (AURA), Henrik Melin (Northumbria University), Leigh Fletcher (University of Leicester), Stefanie Milam (NASA-GSFC)

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For the first time, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has captured bright auroral activity on Neptune. Auroras occur when energetic particles, often originating from the Sun, become trapped in a planet’s magnetic field and eventually strike the upper atmosphere. The energy released during these collisions creates the signature glow.

In the past, astronomers have seen tantalizing hints of auroral activity on Neptune, for example, in the flyby of NASA’s Voyager 2 in 1989. However, imaging and confirming the auroras on Neptune has long evaded astronomers despite successful detections on Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. Neptune was the missing piece of the puzzle when it came to detecting auroras on the giant planets of our solar system.

“Turns out, actually imaging the auroral activity on Neptune was only possible with Webb’s near-infrared sensitivity,” said lead author Henrik Melin of Northumbria University, who conducted the research while at the University of Leicester. “It was so stunning to not just see the auroras, but the detail and clarity of the signature really shocked me.”

The data was obtained in June 2023 using Webb’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph. In addition to the image of the planet, astronomers obtained a spectrum to characterize the composition and measure the temperature of the planet’s upper atmosphere (the ionosphere). For the first time, they found an extremely prominent emission line signifying the presence of the trihydrogen cation (H₃⁺), which can be created in auroras. In the Webb images of Neptune, the glowing aurora appears as splotches represented in cyan.

“H₃⁺ has a been a clear signifier on all the gas giants — Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus — of auroral activity, and we expected to see the same on Neptune as we investigated the planet over the years with the best ground-based facilities available,” explained Heidi Hammel of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Webb interdisciplinary scientist and leader of the Guaranteed Time Observation program in which the data were obtained. “Only with a machine like Webb have we finally gotten that confirmation.”

The auroral activity seen on Neptune is also noticeably different from what we are accustomed to seeing here on Earth, or even Jupiter or Saturn. Instead of being confined to the planet’s northern and southern poles, Neptune’s auroras are located at the planet’s geographic mid-latitudes — think where South America is located on Earth.

This is due to the strange nature of Neptune’s magnetic field, originally discovered by Voyager 2 in 1989, which is tilted by 47 degrees from the planet’s rotation axis. Since auroral activity is based where the magnetic fields converge into the planet’s atmosphere, Neptune’s auroras are far from its rotational poles.

The ground-breaking detection of Neptune’s auroras will help us understand how Neptune’s magnetic field interacts with particles that stream out from the Sun to the distant reaches of our solar system, a totally new window in ice giant atmospheric science.

From the Webb observations, the team also measured the temperature of the top of Neptune’s atmosphere for the first time since Voyager 2’s flyby. The results hint at why Neptune’s auroras remained hidden from astronomers for so long.

“I was astonished — Neptune’s upper atmosphere has cooled by several hundreds of degrees,” Melin said. “In fact, the temperature in 2023 was just over half of that in 1989.”

Through the years, astronomers have predicted the intensity of Neptune’s auroras based on the temperature recorded by Voyager 2. A substantially colder temperature would result in much fainter auroras. This cold temperature is likely the reason that Neptune’s auroras have remained undetected for so long. The dramatic cooling also suggests that this region of the atmosphere can change greatly even though the planet sits over 30 times farther from the Sun compared to Earth.

Equipped with these new findings, astronomers now hope to study Neptune with Webb over a full solar cycle, an 11-year period of activity driven by the Sun’s magnetic field. Results could provide insights into the origin of Neptune’s bizarre magnetic field, and even explain why it’s so tilted.

“As we look ahead and dream of future missions to Uranus and Neptune, we now know how important it will be to have instruments tuned to the wavelengths of infrared light to continue to study the auroras,” added Leigh Fletcher of Leicester University, co-author on the paper. “This observatory has finally opened the window onto this last, previously hidden ionosphere of the giant planets.”

These observations, led by Fletcher, were taken as part of Hammel’s Guaranteed Time Observation program 1249. The team’s results have been published in Nature Astronomy.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world's premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

Source: NASA's James Webb Space Telescope/News

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Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Maryland

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Science: Henrik Melin (Northumbria University)

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• Northumbria University Press Release

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A chance alignment in Lupus

NGC 5530

A spiral galaxy, seen tilted at a slight angle, on a dark background of space. It glows softly from its centre, throughout its disc out to the edge. The disc is a broad swirl of webs of dark reddish dust and sparkling blue patches where stars have formed. Atop the centre of the galaxy there is a star that appears very large and bright with four spikes emanating from it, because it is relatively close to Earth. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Thilker

The subject of today’s NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Picture of the Week is the stunning spiral galaxy NGC 5530. NGC 5530 is situated 40 million light-years away in the constellation Lupus (The Wolf). This galaxy is classified as a ‘flocculent’ spiral, meaning that its spiral arms are patchy and indistinct.

While some galaxies have extraordinarily bright centres where they host a feasting supermassive black hole, the bright source near the centre of NGC 5530 is not an active black hole but instead a star within our own galaxy, only 10 thousand light-years from Earth. This chance alignment gives the appearance that the star is at the dense heart of NGC 5530.

If you had pointed a backyard telescope at NGC 5530 on the evening of 13 September 2007, you would have seen another bright point of light adorning the galaxy. That night, Australian amateur astronomer Robert Evans discovered a supernova, named SN 2007IT, by comparing NGC 5530’s appearance through the telescope to a reference photo of the galaxy. While it’s remarkable to discover even one supernova using this painstaking method, Evans has in fact discovered more than 40 supernovae this way! This particular discovery was truly serendipitous: it’s likely that the light from the supernova had completed its 40-million-year journey to Earth just days before the explosion was discovered.

Source: ESA/Hubble/potw

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Galaxy Clusters 4.1 Billion Years Away (Left) and 6.2 Billion Years Away (Right)

Detail: Low Res. (142 KB)  - Mid. Res. (570 KB) - High Res. (5.10 MB)

As the Universe expands, the wavelengths of light emitted from distant celestial objects are stretched, causing the light to appear redder. This phenomenon is known as redshift, where light from more distant objects becomes redder. In the case of these two galaxy clusters, the cluster located 6.2 billion light-years away (right) is farther than the cluster 4.1 billion light-years away (left), showing redder colors. Redshift is crucial for astronomers to measure a precise distance to a distant object.
Please click 4.1 Billion Years Away（ 9.2 MB ） / 6.2 billion light-years away（ 9.8 MB） for high-resolution images. Credit: NAOJ; Image provided by Masayuki Tanaka

Instrument: Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC)

Announcement (as of March 21, 2025):

In commemorating the Subaru Telescope’s 25th anniversary, we have added new gallery images twice a month since April 2024. We hope you have enjoyed the stunning images captured by the Subaru Telescope. A new series will launch in April 2025, featuring a new image of Maunakea on the first Thursday of each month and a celestial image taken by the Subaru Telescope on the third Thursday (Japan Standard Time). Please stay tuned to the Subaru Gallery throughout Fiscal Year 2025 (April 2025 – March 2026).

Source: Subaru telescope/Press Release

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NASA's Webb Telescope Unmasks True Nature of the Cosmic Tornado

Herbig-Haro 49/50 (NIRCam and MIRI Image)
Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Herbig-Haro 49/50 (Spitzer and Webb Images)
Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, NASA-JPL, SSC

Herbig-Haro 49/50 (NIRCam and MIRI Compass Image)
Credits/Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Herbig-Haro 49/50 Stellar Jets (Video)

Credits/Video: NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Leah Hustak (STScI), Greg Bacon (STScI), Ralf Crawford (STScI), Danielle Kirshenblat (STScI), Christian Nieves (STScI), Alyssa Pagan (STScI), Frank Summers (STScI)

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Craving an ice cream sundae with a cherry on top? This random alignment of Herbig-Haro 49/50 — a frothy-looking outflow from a nearby protostar — with a multi-hued spiral galaxy may do the trick. This new composite image combining observations from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) and MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) provides a high-resolution view to explore the exquisite details of this bubbling activity.

Herbig-Haro objects are outflows produced by jets launched from a nearby, forming star. The outflows, which can extend for light-years, plow into a denser region of material. This creates shock waves, heating the material to higher temperatures. The material then cools by emitting light at visible and infrared wavelengths.

When NASA's retired Spitzer Space Telescope observed it in 2006, scientists nicknamed Herbig-Haro 49/50 (HH 49/50) the “Cosmic Tornado” for its helical appearance, but they were uncertain about the nature of the fuzzy object at the tip of the “tornado.”  With its higher imaging resolution, Webb provides a different visual impression of HH 49/50 by revealing fine features of the shocked regions in the outflow, uncovering the fuzzy object to be a distant spiral galaxy, and displaying a sea of distant background galaxies.

HH 49/50 is located in the Chamaeleon I Cloud complex, one of the nearest active star formation regions in our Milky Way, which is creating numerous low-mass stars similar to our Sun. This cloud complex is likely similar to the environment that our Sun formed in. Past observations of this region show that the HH 49/50 outflow is moving away from us at speeds of 60-190 miles per second (100-300 kilometers per second) and is just one feature of a larger outflow.

Webb’s NIRCam and MIRI observations of HH 49/50 trace the location of glowing hydrogen molecules, carbon monoxide molecules, and energized grains of dust, represented in orange and red, as the protostellar jet slams into the region. Webb’s observations probe details on small spatial scales that will help astronomers to model the properties of the jet and understand how it is affecting the surrounding material.

The arc-shaped features in HH 49/50, similar to a water wake created by a speeding boat, point back to the source of this outflow. Based on past observations, scientists suspect that a protostar known as Cederblad 110 IRS4 is a plausible driver of the jet activity. Located roughly 1.5 light-years away from HH 49/50 (off the lower right corner of the Webb image), CED 110 IRS4 is a Class I protostar. Class I protostars are young objects (tens of thousands to a million years old) in the prime time of gaining mass. They usually have a discernable disk of material surrounding it that is still falling onto the protostar. Scientists recently used Webb’s NIRCam and MIRI observations to study this protostar and obtain an inventory of the icy composition of its environment.

These detailed Webb images of the arcs in HH 49/50 can more precisely pinpoint the direction to the jet source, but not every arc points back in the same direction. For example, there is an unusual outcrop feature (at the top right of the main outflow) which could be another chance superposition of a different outflow, related to the slow precession of the intermittent jet source. Alternatively, this feature could be a result of the main outflow breaking apart.

The galaxy that appears by happenstance at the tip of HH 49/50 is a much more distant, face-on spiral galaxy. It has a prominent central bulge represented in blue that shows the location of older stars. The bulge also shows hints of “side lobes” suggesting that this could be a barred-spiral galaxy. Reddish clumps within the spiral arms show the locations of warm dust and groups of forming stars. The galaxy even displays evacuated bubbles in these dusty regions, similar to nearby galaxies observed by Webb as part of the PHANGS program.

Webb has captured these two unassociated objects in a lucky alignment. Over thousands of years, the edge of HH 49/50 will move outwards and eventually appear to cover up the distant galaxy.

Want more? Take a closer look at the image, “fly through” it in a visualization, and compare Webb’s image to the Spitzer Space Telescope’s.

Herbig-Haro 49/50 is located about 625 light-years from Earth in the constellation Chamaeleon.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world's premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency.

Source: NASA's James Webb Space Telescope/News

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Cosmic anomaly hints at frightening future for Milky Way

The giant radio jets stretching six million light-years across and an enormous supermassive black hole at the heart of spiral galaxy J23453268−0449256, as imaged by the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope. Credit: Bagchi and Ray et al/Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope

Licence type: Attribution (CC BY 4.0)

A terrifying glimpse at one potential fate of our Milky Way galaxy has come to light thanks to the discovery of a cosmic anomaly that challenges our understanding of the universe.

An international team of astronomers led by CHRIST University, Bangalore, found that a massive spiral galaxy almost one billion light-years away from Earth harbours a supermassive black hole billions of times the Sun’s mass which is powering colossal radio jets stretching six million light-years across.

That is one of the largest known for any spiral galaxy and upends conventional wisdom of galaxy evolution, because such powerful jets are almost exclusively found in elliptical galaxies, not spirals.

It also means the Milky Way could potentially create similar energetic jets in the future – with the cosmic rays, gamma rays and X-rays they produce wreaking havoc in our solar system because of increased radiation and the potential to cause a mass extinction on Earth.

A re-think of galaxy evolution

"This discovery is more than just an oddity – it forces us to rethink how galaxies evolve, and how supermassive black holes grow in them and shape their environments," said lead author Professor Joydeep Bagchi, of CHRIST University, Bangalore.

"If a spiral galaxy can not only survive but thrive under such extreme conditions, what does this mean for the future of galaxies like our own Milky Way?

"Could our galaxy one day experience similar high-energy phenomena that will have serious consequences for the survival of precious life in it?"

In the new study, which has been published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, researchers unravelled the structure and evolution of the spiral galaxy 2MASX J23453268−0449256, which is three times the size of the Milky Way.

Using observations from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope, the Atacama Large Millimeter Wave Array and multi-wavelength analyses, they detected an enormous supermassive black hole at its heart and radio jets that are among the largest known for any spiral galaxy, making it a rare phenomenon.

Traditionally, scientists believed that the violent activity of such colossal jets of supermassive black holes would disrupt the delicate structure of a spiral galaxy.

Yet, against all odds, 2MASX J23453268−0449256 has retained its tranquil nature with well-defined spiral arms, a luminous nuclear bar, and an undisturbed stellar ring – all while hosting one of the most extreme black holes ever observed in such a setting.

Adding to the enigma, the galaxy is surrounded by a vast halo of hot, X-ray-emitting gas, providing key insights into its history. While this halo slowly cools over time, the black hole's jets act like a cosmic furnace, preventing new star formation despite the presence of abundant star-making material.

Colour image of J23453268-0449256, which is 300,000 light-years across, as captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. It is shown alongside a depiction of our own Milky Way galaxy, which is three times smaller. Credit: Bagchi and Ray et al/Hubble Space Telescope

Licence type: Attribution (CC BY 4.0)

How this compares to Milky Way

Our own Milky Way has a 4 million solar mass black hole – Sagittarius A (Sgr A*) – at its centre, but this is currently in an extremely quiet and dormant state.

That could change if a gas cloud, star, or even a small dwarf galaxy were to be accreted (effectively eaten), the researchers said, potentially triggering significant jet activity. Such events are known as Tidal Disruption Events (TDE) and several have been observed in other galaxies, but not in the Milky Way

. If large jets like this were to emerge from Sgr A*, their impact would depend on their strength, direction, and energy output, the researchers said.

One pointed near our solar system could strip away planetary atmospheres, damage DNA and increase mutation rates because of radiation exposure, while if Earth were exposed to a direct or nearby jet, it could degrade our ozone layer and lead to a mass extinction.

A third possibility is that a powerful jet could alter the interstellar medium and affect star formation in certain regions, which is what has happened in the galaxy the new paper focused on.

Astronomers believe the Milky Way likely had large-scale radio jets in the past and although it could potentially generate them again in the future, experts aren't able to say exactly when because it depends on many factors.

Dark matter clues

The team of researchers also discovered that J23453268−0449256 contains 10 times more dark matter than the Milky Way, which is crucial for stability of its fast spinning disc.

By revealing an unprecedented balance between dark matter, black hole activity, and galactic structure, the experts said their study opens new frontiers in astrophysics and cosmology.

"Understanding these rare galaxies could provide vital clues about the unseen forces governing the universe – including the nature of dark matter, the long-term fate of galaxies, and the origin of life," said co-author Shankar Ray, a PhD student at CHRIST University, Bangalore.

"Ultimately, this study brings us one step closer to unravelling the mysteries of the cosmos, reminding us that the universe still holds surprises beyond our imagination."

Submitted by Sam Tonkin

Source: Royal Astronomical Society (RAS)/News

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Media contacts

Sam Tonkin
Royal Astronomical Society
Mob: +44 (0)7802 877 700
press@ras.ac.uk

Dr Robert Massey
Royal Astronomical Society
Mob: +44 (0)7802 877 699
press@ras.ac.uk

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Scientific contacts

Professor Joydeep Bagchi
CHRIST University, Bangalore
joydeep.bagchi@christuniversity.in

Suraj Dhiwar
Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics
suraj@iucaa.in

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Notes for editors

About the Royal Astronomical Society

The Royal Astronomical Society (RAS), founded in 1820, encourages and promotes the study of astronomy, solar-system science, geophysics and closely related branches of science.
The RAS organises scientific meetings, publishes international research and review journals, recognises outstanding achievements by the award of medals and prizes, maintains an extensive library, supports education through grants and outreach activities and represents UK astronomy nationally and internationally. Its more than 4,000 members (Fellows), a third based overseas, include scientific researchers in universities, observatories and laboratories as well as historians of astronomy and others.

The RAS accepts papers for its journals based on the principle of peer review, in which fellow experts on the editorial boards accept the paper as worth considering. The Society issues press releases based on a similar principle, but the organisations and scientists concerned have overall responsibility for their content.

Keep up with the RAS on X,Facebook,LinkedIn YouTube.

Download the RAS Supermassive podcast

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Gravitationally Lensed Gravitational Waves from Black Holes Around Black Holes

I

llustration of stellar-mass black holes embedded within the accretion disk of a supermassive black hole.
Credit: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)

Diagram of a binary black hole system orbiting within the disk of a supermassive black hole
The observer is located at N in this diagram.
Credit:Leong et al. 2025

Gravitational-wave detectors have captured the chirps of dozens of merging black holes. Could any of these mergers have happened in the disk around a supermassive black hole?

Black Holes Around Black Holes

At the centers of galaxies across the universe, the disks surrounding accreting supermassive black holes — known as active galactic nuclei — provide an extreme ecosystem for stars and stellar-mass black holes. When a pair of black holes within an active galactic nucleus disk merges, the collision produces gravitational waves that can be picked up by detectors on Earth. If, from our perspective, that merger takes place behind the supermassive black hole, the gravitational-wave signal will be gravitationally lensed: split into two “images” of the same wave with slightly different properties.

Detecting a gravitationally lensed gravitational-wave signal from merging black holes would provide valuable information about the population of black holes that reside in active galactic nucleus disks, as well as the properties of the disks themselves.

Constraints able to be placed on the fraction of binary black hole mergers happening in active galactic nucleus disks as a function of the number of observations, Nobs, and the distance between the binary system and the central supermassive black hole, indicated by the fill pattern. The filled area shows the values that are ruled out. This plot assumes that no gravitationally lensed gravitational waves are observed. Adapted from Leong et al. 2025

Lensing Likelihood

So far, no gravitationally lensed gravitational waves have been detected — but luckily, even this non-detection contains valuable information. To explore the implications of this non-detection, Samson Leong (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) and collaborators developed an analytical model that describes a binary black hole pair orbiting and merging within the disk of an active galactic nucleus. The team calculated the probability that gravitational waves from the merger of these black holes would be gravitationally lensed from the perspective of a distant observer. This probability is dependent upon the orientation of the disk relative to the viewer, as well as the distance from the binary system to the central supermassive black hole.

Then, given the fact that none of the dozens of mergers detected so far have had gravitationally lensed signals, Leong’s team constrained the fraction of observed mergers happening in active galactic nucleus disks. With only about 100 binary black hole merger observed to date, the constraining power of the non-detection is limited. For now, all that can be said is that no more than 47% of the observed mergers took place in the disks around active galactic nuclei. As the number of detected black hole mergers grows, the constraint will grow more stringent; if no lensed events have been observed after roughly 1,000 mergers have been detected, that would mean that no more than 5% of the mergers took place within an active galactic nucleus disk.

Similar to the previous figure, but this time emphasizing the impact of the orbital distance of the merging black holes. The vertical dotted lines indicate the locations of potential migration traps. Adapted from Leong et al. 2025

To Be Constrained

This estimate is based on the assumption that all black holes in active galactic nucleus disks merge within the migration trap nearest the central supermassive black hole. Several migration traps — particular orbital radii within the disk where black holes are expected to collect — are predicted to exist. If the black holes instead merge within a migration trap at a much larger radius, many more observations will be needed to narrowly constrain the number of mergers happening within accretion disks.

Future observations may yield new information about active galactic nucleus accretion disks. In particular, it may be possible to discern the minimum size of an accretion disk, as well as where within the disk binary black holes are most likely to merge.

By Kerry Hensley

Citation

“Constraining Binary Mergers in Active Galactic Nuclei Disks Using the Nonobservation of Lensed Gravitational Waves,” Samson H. W. Leong et al 2025 ApJL 979 L27. doi:10.3847/2041-8213/ad9ead

 

Source: American Astronomical Society/AAS-Nova

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Euclid opens data treasure trove, offers glimpse of deep fields

This image shows examples of galaxies in different shapes, all captured by Euclid during its first observations of the Deep Field areas. As part of the data release, a detailed catalogue of more than 380,000 galaxies was published, which have been classified according to features such as spiral arms, central bars, and tidal tails that infer merging galaxies. © ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by M. Walmsley, M. Huertas-Company, J.-C. Cuillandre

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Germany’s role in unveiling the dark universe

Germany’s members of the Euclid Consortium have played a significant role in producing the mission’s first large set of survey data which the European Space Agency has just released. The data includes stunning images of deep fields with a breathtaking number of 26 million galaxies, many showing their detailed structures. More than 380,000 galaxies have been characterized according to their shapes and distances. Nevertheless, this impressive milestone is only a foretaste of what we can expect in the coming years.

Covering a vast sky area in three mosaics, the data release also includes numerous galaxy clusters, active galactic nuclei and transient phenomena. This first survey data unlocks a treasure trove of information for scientists to dive into and tackle some of the most intriguing questions in modern science. Euclid enables us to explore our cosmic history and the invisible forces shaping our universe.

With its exceptionally large field of view for a space telescope, capturing an area 240 times larger in a single shot than the Hubble Telescope, Euclid delivers outstanding image quality in both the visible and infrared light spectrum.

This is Euclid’s Deep Field South. After only one observation, the space telescope already spotted more than 11 million galaxies in this field. In the coming years, Euclid will make more observations of this field to reach its full depth. When looking at the image, a glimpse of the large-scale structure of the Universe can be seen. This is the organisation of galaxies along the so-called ‘cosmic web’. This web consists of huge clusters of galaxies connected to one another by strands of gas and invisible dark matter. Euclid’s Deep Field South covers 28.1 square degrees in the southern constellation of Horologium, the pendulum clock. This field has not been covered to date by any deep sky survey and so has a huge potential for new, exciting discoveries.© ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, E. Bertin, G. Anselmi

Crucial contributions from Germany

Euclid is particularly impressive in the infrared channel, for which the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE) in Garching near Munich and the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg provided critical components. After passing through four lenses, a filter, and a beam splitter, it achieves an extraordinarily high contrast. “The requirements for suppressing ghost images are exceeded by a factor of one hundred. The optical design and the precise execution of the optics at MPE and MPIA set new standards for image sharpness and contrast,” says Frank Grupp, who led the development of the near-infrared optics at MPE.

MPE is also contributing to research on galaxy evolution. “We have compiled a catalogue of over 70,000 spectroscopic redshifts from various sky surveys and combined it with the Euclid data,” explains Christoph Saulder, who led this part of the project. “This catalogue allows for precise distance measurements and the clear identification of numerous galaxies and quasars in Euclid’s high-resolution images. It serves as a foundation for a deeper understanding of these objects, their distribution, and their internal properties.”

“The new data are also being used to test the techniques for measuring cosmic shear and calibrating redshifts, which will soon be applied to the much larger Euclid data sets to achieve the primary scientific goal – the precision measurement of dark energy,” says Hendrik Hildebrandt from Ruhr University Bochum. He leads the key project for measuring cosmic shear and the redshift calibration task force.

Furthermore, scientists at Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU) in Munich have tested methods to identify and characterize galaxy overdensities, a crucial step in tracing the universe's large-scale structure. “The methodologies used to pinpoint galaxy clusters in this task will be key to fully exploiting Euclid’s vast dataset, improving cluster identification and contributing to a deeper understanding of cosmic structure formation. At the same time, they help explore previously uncharted regimes in the near-infrared with a statistically significant sample of objects,” says LMU scientist Barbara Sartoris.

Likewise, MPIA scientists play leading roles in numerous Euclid studies. They use the data to identify growing supermassive black holes, answer fundamental questions about galaxy evolution, and perform precise photometric measurements of young and old transient celestial objects.

This image shows an area of Euclid’s Deep Field South. The area is zoomed in 16 times compared to the large mosaic. Many galaxies are visible in this field, all with different shapes and colours because they have different ages and distances. © ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, E. Bertin, G. Anselmi

Tracing out the cosmic web in Euclid’s deep fields

Euclid has scouted out the three areas in the sky where it will eventually provide the deepest observations of its mission. In just one week of observations and one scan of each region so far, Euclid spotted already 26 million galaxies. The most distant of those are up to 10.5 billion light-years away. The fields span a combined area equivalent to more than 300 times the full Moon.

In order to unravel the mysteries it is designed to explore, Euclid precisely measures the various shapes and the distribution of billions of galaxies with its high-resolution imaging visible instrument (VIS). In contrast, its near-infrared instrument (NISP) is essential for determining galaxy distances and masses.

MPE was responsible for designing and constructing the NISP near-infrared optics. In turn, MPIA carries out crucial tasks for NISP’s calibration. “MPIA engineers and scientists are developing and maintaining the mission’s entire calibration plan, calibrating and scientifically monitoring the near-infrared camera NISP, performing simulations, and conducting technical analyses such as instrument monitoring,” says MPIA’s Mischa Schirmer. He is the Euclid mission calibration and NISP calibration scientist.

The new images are a testimony to these efforts and showcase Euclid's capability of mapping hundreds of thousands of galaxies, and start to hint at the large-scale organization of these galaxies in the cosmic web.

This image shows an area of Euclid’s Deep Field South. The area is zoomed in 70 times compared to the large mosaic. Various huge galaxy clusters are visible in this image, as well as intra-cluster light, and gravitational lenses. The cluster near the centre is called J041110.98-481939.3, and is located almost 6 billion light-years away. © ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre, E. Bertin, G. Anselmi

Data processing and object classification

Euclid is expected to capture images of more than 1.5 billion galaxies over six years, sending back around 100 GB of data daily. Such an impressively large dataset creates incredible discovery opportunities, but also poses enormous challenges.

The Euclid consortium has established a European network of nine data centres, including the German Science Data Center (SDC-DE) at MPE. It is equipped with 7,000 processors and processes 10% of the data recorded by Euclid. A team of at least ten experts ensures smooth and consistent processing of astronomical imaging data. MPE’s Max Fabricius, who leads the SDC-DE, says: “Approximately 100 GB of raw data is processed virtually in real time every day. The demands on photometric precision are enormous and require a completely new approach to the methods used to calibrate the data.”

When it comes to searching for, analysing and cataloguing galaxies, the advancement of machine learning algorithms, in combination with thousands of human citizen science volunteers and experts, is playing a critical role. It is a fundamental and necessary tool to fully exploit Euclid’s vast dataset. A significant landmark in this effort is the first detailed catalogue of more than 380,000 galaxies, which have been characterized according to features such as spiral arms, central bars, and tidal tails that infer merging galaxies.

This first catalogue released today represents just 0.4% of the total number of galaxies of similar resolution expected to be imaged over Euclid’s lifetime. The final catalogue will present the detailed morphology of at least an order of magnitude more galaxies than ever measured before, helping scientists answer questions like how spiral arms form and how supermassive black holes grow.

Gravitational lensing discovery engine

Light travelling towards us from distant galaxies is bent and distorted by normal and dark matter in the foreground. This effect is called gravitational lensing and is one of Euclid’s tools to reveal how dark matter is distributed throughout the universe. When the distortions are very apparent, it is known as ‘strong lensing’, which can result in features such as Einstein rings, arcs, and multiple imaged lenses.

A first catalogue of 500 galaxy-galaxy strong lens candidates is released today, almost all previously unknown. MPIA scientists were involved in gravitational lensing classifications, labelling images with markers according to their probability of being lenses, as input for machine learning. “These AI systems will ultimately be essential for analysing the 200 times larger sky area at the end of the mission. The number of galaxies distorted by lensing will eventually increase to a staggering 100,000, about 100 times more than currently known. Human classification of individual objects will not be possible for this unprecedented dataset,” emphasizes Knud Jahnke from MPIA. He is the NISP instrument scientist.

Euclid will also be able to measure ‘weak’ lensing, when the distortions of background sources are much smaller. Such subtle distortions can only be detected by statistically analysing large numbers of galaxies. In the coming years, Euclid will measure the distorted shapes of billions of galaxies over 10 billion years of cosmic history, thus providing a 3D view of the distribution of dark matter in our universe.

Background information

As of 19 March 2025, Euclid has observed about 2000 square degrees, approximately 14% of the total survey area. The three deep fields together comprise 63.1 square degrees.

Euclid ‘quick’ releases, such as the one of 19 March, are of selected areas. They are intended to demonstrate the data products expected in the major data releases that follow, and to allow scientists to sharpen their data analysis tools in preparation. The mission’s first cosmology data will be released to the community in October 2026. Data accumulated over additional, multiple passes of the deep field locations will be included in the 2026 release.

The data release of 19 March 2025 is described in multiple scientific papers that have not yet been through the peer-review process but will be submitted to the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

The University of Bonn hosts the Euclid Publication Office, where the scientific publications of the Euclid Consortium are coordinated and reviewed.

Source: Max Planck Institute for Astronomy/MPIA News

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NOTICE!: The images accompanying this press release are subject to an ESA embargo until 19 March 2025, 12:00 p.m. CET. To get access to the images before the expiry of the embargo period, media representatives can register here.

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About Euclid

Euclid was launched in July 2023 and started its routine science observations on 14 February 2024. It is a European mission, built and operated by the European Space Agency (ESA), with contributions from its member states and NASA. The Euclid Consortium – consisting of more than 2000 scientists from 300 institutes in 15 European countries, the USA, Canada, and Japan – is responsible for providing the scientific instruments and scientific data analysis. ESA selected Thales Alenia Space as prime contractor for constructing the satellite and its service module, with Airbus Defence and Space chosen to develop the payload module, including the telescope. NASA provided the detectors of the Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer, NISP. Euclid is a medium-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision Programme.

From Germany, the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching, the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich, the University of Bonn, the Ruhr University Bochum, the University of Bielefeld, and the German Space Agency at the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) in Bonn are participating in the Euclid project.

The German Space Agency at DLR coordinates the German ESA contributions and provides funding of 60 million euros from the National Space Programme for the participating German research institutes.

With around 21%, Germany is the most significant contributor to the ESA science programme.

This news item is based on an ESA press release that was published at the same time. Additional images are available via that release.

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Contacts:

Dr. Markus Nielbock
National coordinator for communication of the German research institutes of the Euclid Consortium
tel: +49 6221 528-134
pr@mpia.de
Euclid Consortium
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg, Germany

Dr. Maximilian Fabricius
tel: +49 89 30000-3712
mxhf@mpe.mpg.de
Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, Garching, Germany

Dr. Frank Grupp
tel: +49 89 30000-3956
fgrupp@mpe.mpg.de
Ludwig Maximilian University Munich
Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, Garching, Germany

Dr. Knud Jahnke
tel: +49 6221 528-398
jahnke@mpia.de
Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg, Germany

Prof. Dr. Hendrik Hildebrandt
tel: +49 234 322-4019
hendrik@astro.rub.de
Astronomisches Institut
Ruhr-University Bochum, Bochum, Germany

Martin Fleischmann
tel: +49 228 447-120
Martin.Fleischmann@dlr.de
German Aerospace Center (DLR), Bonn, Germany

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Links

• ESA press release
• Euclid Consortium
• Pre-prints of articles relating to this data release (from 19 March)
• ESA’s Cosmic Vision programme

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Oxygen discovered in most distant known galaxy

PR Image eso2507a
Furthest detection of oxygen in the early Universe

PR Image eso2507b
Oxygen spectrum in most distant known galaxy

PR Image eso2507c
Artist’s impression of JADES-GS-z14-0

PR Image eso2507d
Wide-field view of the region of the sky around JADES-GS-z14-0

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Videos


PR Video eso2507a
Oxygen discovered in most distant galaxy


PR Video eso2507b
When oxygen was first born


PR Video eso2507c
Zooming in on JADES-GS-z14-0

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Two different teams of astronomers have detected oxygen in the most distant known galaxy, JADES-GS-z14-0. The discovery, reported in two separate studies, was made possible thanks to the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which the European Southern Observatory (ESO) is a partner. This record-breaking detection is making astronomers rethink how quickly galaxies formed in the early Universe.

JADES-GS-z14-0 is the most distant confirmed galaxy ever found: it is so far away, its light took 13.4 billion years to reach us, meaning we see it as it was when the Universe was less than 300 million years old, about 2% of its present age. The new oxygen detection with ALMA, a telescope array in Chile’s Atacama Desert, suggests the galaxy is much more chemically mature than expected.

“It is like finding an adolescent where you would only expect babies,” says Sander Schouws, a PhD candidate at Leiden Observatory, the Netherlands, and first author of the Dutch-led study, now accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal. “The results show the galaxy has formed very rapidly and is also maturing rapidly, adding to a growing body of evidence that the formation of galaxies happens much faster than was expected."

Galaxies usually start their lives full of young stars, which are made mostly of light elements like hydrogen and helium. As stars evolve, they create heavier elements like oxygen, which get dispersed through their host galaxy after they die. Researchers had thought that, at 300 million years old, the Universe was still too young to have galaxies ripe with heavy elements. However, the two ALMA studies indicate JADES-GS-z14-0 has about 10 times more heavy elements than expected.

“I was astonished by the unexpected results because they opened a new view on the first phases of galaxy evolution,” says Stefano Carniani, of the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa, Italy, and lead author on the paper now accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics. “The evidence that a galaxy is already mature in the infant Universe raises questions about when and how galaxies formed.”

The oxygen detection has also allowed astronomers to make their distance measurements to JADES-GS-z14-0 much more accurate. “The ALMA detection offers an extraordinarily precise measurement of the galaxy’s distance down to an uncertainty of just 0.005 percent. This level of precision — analogous to being accurate within 5 cm over a distance of 1 km — helps refine our understanding of distant galaxy properties,” adds Eleonora Parlanti, a PhD student at the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa and author on the Astronomy & Astrophysics study [1].

“While the galaxy was originally discovered with the James Webb Space Telescope, it took ALMA to confirm and precisely determine its enormous distance,” [2] says Associate Professor Rychard Bouwens, a member of the team at Leiden Observatory. “This shows the amazing synergy between ALMA and JWST to reveal the formation and evolution of the first galaxies.”

Gergö Popping, an ESO astronomer at the European ALMA Regional Centre who did not take part in the studies, says: "I was really surprised by this clear detection of oxygen in JADES-GS-z14-0. It suggests galaxies can form more rapidly after the Big Bang than had previously been thought. This result showcases the important role ALMA plays in unraveling the conditions under which the first galaxies in our Universe formed."

Source: ESO/News

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Notes

[1] Astronomers use a measurement known as redshift to determine the distance to extremely distant objects. Previous measurements indicated that the galaxy JADES-GS-z-14-0 was at a redshift between about 14.12 and 14.4. With their oxygen detections, both teams have now narrowed this down to a redshift around 14.18.

[2] The James Webb Space Telescope is a joint project of NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

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More information

This research was presented in two papers to appear in Astronomy & Astrophysics (https://aanda.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202452451) andThe Astrophysical Journal.

The teams are composed of:

Italian-led, Astronomy & Astrophysics paper: Stefano Carniani (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa, Italy [SNS]), Francesco D’Eugenio (Kavli Institute for Cosmology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK [CAM-KIC]; Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK [CAM-CavL] and INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera, Milano, Italy), Xihan Ji (CAM-KIC and CAM-CavL), Eleonora Parlanti (SNS), Jan Scholtz (CAM-KIC and CAM-CavL), Fengwu Sun (Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, Cambridge, USA [CfA]), Giacomo Venturi (SNS), Tom J. L. C. Bakx (Department of Space, Earth, & Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden), Mirko Curti (European Southern Observatory, Garching bei München, Germany), Roberto Maiolino (CAM-KIC, CAM-CavL and Department of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, London, UK [UCL]), Sandro Tacchella (CAM-KIC and CAM-CavL), Jorge A. Zavala (National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, Tokyo, Japan), Kevin Hainline (Steward Observatory, University of Arizona, Tucson, USA [UArizona-SO]), Joris Witstok (Cosmic Dawn Center, Copenhagen, Denmark [DAWN] and CAM-CavL), Benjamin D. Johnson [CfA], Stacey Alberts [UArizona-SO], Andrew J. Bunker (Department of Physics, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK [Oxford]), Stéphane Charlot (Sorbonne Université, CNRS, Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris, Paris, France), Daniel J. Eisenstein (CfA), Jakob M. Helton (UArizona-SO), Peter Jakobsen (DAWN and Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark), Nimisha Kumari (Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, USA), Brant Robertson (Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics University of California, Santa Cruz, USA), Aayush Saxena (Oxford and UCL), Hannah Übler (CAM-KIC and CAM-CavL), Christina C. Williams (NSF NOIRLab, Tucson, USA), Christopher N. A. Willmer (UArizona-SO) and Chris Willott (NRC Herzberg, Victoria, Canada).

Dutch-led, The Astrophysical Journal paper: Sander Schouws (Leiden Observatory, Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands [Leiden]), Rychard J. Bouwens (Leiden), Katherine Ormerod (Astrophysics Research Institute, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, United Kingdom [LJMU]), Renske Smit (LJMU), Hiddo Algera (Hiroshima Astrophysical Science Center, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan and National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, Tokyo, Japan), Laura Sommovigo (Center for Computational Astrophysics, Flatiron Institute, New York, USA), Jacqueline Hodge (Leiden), Andrea Ferrara (Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa, Italy), Pascal A. Oesch (Département d’Astronomie, Université de Genève, Versoix, Switzerland; Cosmic Dawn Center, Copenhagen, Denmark and Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark), Lucie E. Rowland (Leiden), Ivana van Leeuwen (Leiden), Mauro Stefanon (Leiden), Thomas Herard-Demanche (Leiden), Yoshinobu Fudamoto (Center for Frontier Science, Chiba University, Chiba, Japan), Huub Rottgering (Leiden) and Paul van der Werf (Leiden).

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international astronomy facility, is a partnership of ESO, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS) of Japan in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. ALMA is funded by ESO on behalf of its Member States, by NSF in cooperation with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) and the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) in Taiwan and by NINS in cooperation with the Academia Sinica (AS) in Taiwan and the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI). ALMA construction and operations are led by ESO on behalf of its Member States; by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), managed by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI), on behalf of North America; and by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) on behalf of East Asia. The Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) provides the unified leadership and management of the construction, commissioning and operation of ALMA.

The European Southern Observatory (ESO) enables scientists worldwide to discover the secrets of the Universe for the benefit of all. We design, build and operate world-class observatories on the ground — which astronomers use to tackle exciting questions and spread the fascination of astronomy — and promote international collaboration for astronomy. Established as an intergovernmental organisation in 1962, today ESO is supported by 16 Member States (Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom), along with the host state of Chile and with Australia as a Strategic Partner. ESO’s headquarters and its visitor centre and planetarium, the ESO Supernova, are located close to Munich in Germany, while the Chilean Atacama Desert, a marvellous place with unique conditions to observe the sky, hosts our telescopes. ESO operates three observing sites: La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor. At Paranal, ESO operates the Very Large Telescope and its Very Large Telescope Interferometer, as well as survey telescopes such as VISTA. Also at Paranal ESO will host and operate the Cherenkov Telescope Array South, the world’s largest and most sensitive gamma-ray observatory. Together with international partners, ESO operates ALMA on Chajnantor, a facility that observes the skies in the millimetre and submillimetre range. At Cerro Armazones, near Paranal, we are building “the world’s biggest eye on the sky” — ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope. From our offices in Santiago, Chile we support our operations in the country and engage with Chilean partners and society.

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Links

• Research paper (Carniani et al.)
• Research paper (Schouws et al.)
• Photos of ALMA 
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Contacts:

Stefano Carniani
Scuola Normale Superiore
Pisa, Italy
Tel: +39 050 509156
Email: stefano.carniani@sns.it

Sander Schouws
Leiden University
Leiden, The Netherlands
Email: sanderschouws@gmail.com

Eleonora Parlanti
Scuola Normale Superiore
Pisa, Italy
Email: eleonora.parlanti@sns.it

Rychard Bouwens
Leiden Observatory, University of Leiden
Leiden, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 71 527 8456
Email: bouwens@strw.leidenuniv.nl

Jacqueline Hodge
Leiden Observatory, University of Leiden
Leiden, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 71 527 8450
Email: hodge@strw.leidenuniv.nl

Gergö Popping
European ALMA Regional Centre, European Southern Observatory
Tel: +49 89 3200 6247
Email: gpopping@eso.org

Bárbara Ferreira
ESO Media Manager
Garching bei München, Germany
Tel: +49 89 3200 6670
Cell: +49 151 241 664 00
Email: press@eso.org

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