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  • 2 months ago
Explore one of the earliest stages of star formation with the James Webb Space Telescope's powerful instruments, NIRCam and MIRI. This detailed look at protostar L1527 reveals how layers of dust create vibrant colors and offers new insights into how stars dominate their cosmic environment.

Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Paul Morris: Lead Producer
Thaddeus Cesari: Script
Dr. Michelle Thaller: Narrator

Music Credit:
"Looking to the Future" by Carl David Harms [IMRO] via BBC Production Music [PRS], and Universal Production Music.

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Tech
Transcript
00:01Enshrouded deep within a gaseous cloud, the once hidden features of this young and elusive protostar have been revealed by
00:07the James Webb Space Telescope.
00:09Protostars like these that are still cocooned in a dark cloud of dust and gas have a long way to
00:14go before they become full-fledged stars.
00:16At only about 100,000 years old, it is at the earliest stage of star formation and doesn't yet generate
00:22its own energy through nuclear fusion of hydrogen.
00:25Its shape, while mostly spherical, is also unstable, taking the form of a small, hot, and puffy cloud of gas,
00:32somewhere between 20 and 40 percent the mass of our own sun.
00:36Its signature hourglass shape has helped to provide insight into the beginnings of a new star at the precipice of
00:42a long and dynamic life ahead.
00:44The region's most prevalent features, the vibrant blue and orange clouds, in this representative-color infrared image,
00:51outlined cavities created as material shoots away from the 2b star and collides with surrounding matter.
00:58These blazing clouds within the torus star-forming region are only visible in infrared light, making it an ideal target
01:05for two of Webb's powerful scientific instruments,
01:07the near-infrared camera and the mid-infrared instrument.
01:10The colors themselves are due to layers of dust between Webb and the clouds.
01:14Blue areas show where the dust is thinnest. The thicker the layer of dust, the less blue light is able
01:20to escape, creating rich pockets of orange.
01:23As it continues to gather mass, its core gradually compresses and gets closer to stable nuclear fusion.
01:30The surrounding molecular cloud is made up of dense layers of dust and gas being drawn to the center, where
01:36the protostar resides.
01:37As the material falls in, it spirals around the center. This creates a dense disk of material, known as an
01:44accretion disk, which feeds material to the protostar.
01:48As it gains more mass and compresses further, the temperature of its core will rise, eventually reaching the threshold for
01:55nuclear fusion to begin.
01:57Webb also reveals filaments of molecular hydrogen that have been shocked as the protostar ejects material away from it.
02:03Shocks and turbulence inhibit the formation of new stars, which would otherwise form all throughout the cloud.
02:10As a result, the protostar dominates the space, taking much of the material for itself.
02:28It feels like a huge impact as the depth of инструмент singing it.
02:29We also have arrived at the bottom rail and where the DESTR που might hear from the moon arranged, which
02:29means the homage of the number 1 to 937.
02:29Therefore, craftsmanship is whole

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