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Latest STScI News Release

NASA's Webb Reveals Intricate Layers of Interstellar Dust, Gas

January 14, 2025

A few dozen white stars, some with Webb’s signature 8-point diffraction spikes, on the black background of space. Tightly packed, red-orange filaments extend horizontally from upper left to lower right, with a bulging upward curve on the right that is closer to the top. The filaments resemble wood grain. The image is labeled August 19, 2024 at bottom left.

Source: stsci.edu/news

Tonight's Sky

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Latest JWST News

Webb watches carbon-rich dust shells form, expand in star system

13 January 2025

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have identified two stars responsible for generating carbon-rich dust a mere 5000 light-years away in our own Milky Way galaxy. As the massive stars in Wolf-Rayet 140 swing past one another on their elongated orbits, their winds collide and produce the carbon-rich dust. For a few months every eight years, the stars form a new shell of dust that expands outward — and may eventually go on to become part of stars that form elsewhere in our galaxy.

Source: esawebb.org

JWST Picture of the Month

Source: esawebb.org

NASA Image of the Day

Best of 2024: Dinosaur Prepared to Safely Watch Solar Eclipse

A visitor takes a picture of a sculpture of an adult Alamosaurus wearing solar glasses outside of The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, Saturday, April 6, 2024, in Indianapolis, Ind. On Monday, April 8, 2024, a total solar eclipse swept across a narrow portion of the North American continent from Mexico’s Pacific coast to the Atlantic coast of Newfoundland, Canada.

Tue, 14 Jan 2025 18:43 GMT

Source: www.nasa.gov

Distance: 125 light-years, Magnitude: 3.43

Al Thalimain, Arabic for 'the two ostriches' is a star twice the size of the Sun, 3.1 times more massive and 55 times more luminous. The 160 million years young star lies about 5 degrees from the galactic plane and about 30 degrees from the line of sight to the Galactic Center and rotates at 103 km/s. Lambda shares its name 'Al Thalimain' with Iota Aquilae.

Distance: 18 light-years, Magnitude: 11

Stein 2051 (Gliese 169.1, G 175-034, LHS 26/27) is a nearby binary star system, containing a red dwarf (component A) and a degenerated star, a white dwarf (component B), located in the constellation of Camelopardalis at about 18 light-years away. Stein 2051 B is the 6th nearest white dwarf after Sirius B, Procyon B, van Maanen's star, LP 145-141 and 40 Eridani B.

M75 (Globular Cluster) in Sagittarius

Magnitude: 8.5

M75 is one of the most remote of of all globular clusters, positioned 67,500 light-years beyond the Milky Way's galactic center. Spanning 180 light-years across, it blazes with the brightness of 180,000 suns.

Located south of Scorpio, Ara consists of eight rather dim stars. It can be seen in the south at northern latitudes below 20 degrees. Ara can be found looking from the tail of Scorpius downwards towards the horizon.

Discovered in 2002, 153P/Ikeya-Zhang is a long-periodic comet with the longest known period (366.5 years) for returning comets. On March 18, 2002, the comet last passed perihelion and became the brightest comet since 1997 shining at 3.5 magnitudes. The comets aphelion distance is at over 100 AU away through the Kuiper Belt reaching into the innermost section of the Oort Cloud.

Semi-major: 3.49320 AU, Size: 384 km

Asteroid 87 Sylvia, discovered in May 1866, has two orbiting satellites. They have been named Romulus (3.65 day orbit) and Remus (1.37 day orbit), the central characters of Rome's foundation myth and the children of the mythological Rhea Silvia. The mean size of Sylvia is 286 km.

Dione (moon of Saturn)

Nearly circular shaped Dione was discovered by astronomer Cassini back in 1682. It is more massive than all known moons smaller than itself combined, the third densest of Saturn's moons and largely composed of water ice. Its surface is cratered alongside ice cliffs and varied terrain.

Mass: 3.5 xJup
SMA: 2 AU
Period: 1129 days
Distance: 48.9102 parsec
Category: Cold Jovian
ESI: 0.231958

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