Inbox Astronomy: NASA=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=Webb Identifies Earliest Supernova to Date, Shows Host Galaxy

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NASA’s Webb Identifies Earliest Supernova to Date, Shows Host Galaxy

Release date: Tuesday, December 9, 2025 11:00:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

The telescope captured near-infrared light from one of the earliest stars seen to explode in the history of the universe.

With a few near-infrared snapshots, the James Webb Space Telescope nailed down the source of a super bright flash of light known as a gamma-ray burst, generated when a massive star exploded when the universe was only 730 million years old.

And, for the first time at this point in the history of the universe, the telescope provided a detection of the resulting supernova’s host galaxy.

Webb’s quick-turn observations verified data taken by telescopes around the world that were following the gamma-ray burst that turned up in mid-March.

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Inbox Astronomy: NASA's Roman Could Bring New Waves of Information on Galaxy=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=Stars

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NASA's Roman Could Bring New Waves of Information on Galaxy’s Stars

Release date: Thursday, November 20, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

It’s clear as a bell: Roman can enlighten us on the stars located in the Milky Way’s galactic bulge.

In musical terms, stars are like a constantly playing handbell choir. The turbulence within their interiors creates a pattern of waves — steady oscillations, like a ringing bell — which cause changes in their overall brightness. Studying these fluctuations, a method known as asteroseismology, can provide details about the stars themselves, such as their age, mass, and size.

Building from NASA’s now-retired Kepler space telescope’s successful asteroseismic detections, a team of researchers has recently confirmed that asteroseismology will be possible with NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. Their study also explores different models to provide an estimation of the number of stars that will be detectable via this method. Their results indicate the telescope will provide the largest asteroseismic sample ever collected.

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Inbox Astronomy: Webb First to Show 4 Dust Shells 'Spiraling' Apep, Limits Long Orbit

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Webb First to Show 4 Dust Shells 'Spiraling' Apep, Limits Long Orbit

Release date: Wednesday, November 19, 2025 11:00:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

Researchers used Webb to refine the orbit of two Wolf-Rayet stars, named for the Egyptian god of chaos, to a lengthy 190 years and confirmed a third star carves their ongoing carbon dust ejections.

Coiled shells sent out by two stars known as Apep, after the Egyptian god of chaos, have come into clear view: NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has shown spirals of dust that trace 700 years of activity.

“Webb has observed similar systems, but this shows by far the most detail,” said Yinuo Han, a lead author on a new paper and postdoctoral researcher at Caltech in Pasadena, California. “It's rare enough to see one Wolf-Rayet star, but in Apep there are two. When their stellar winds collide, they produce large amounts of carbonaceous dust over 25 years during each orbit.”

By combining these new mid-infrared observations with a series of images from the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), Han and his collaborators narrowed down how often the stars sail past one another — once every 190 years — and confirmed that a third star, a massive supergiant, is “slicing” holes into the dusty shells.

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Inbox Astronomy: Researchers Submit Record Number of Ambitious Proposals for Webb's Fifth Year of Science

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Researchers Submit Record Number of Ambitious Proposals for Webb's Fifth Year of Science

Release date: Wednesday, November 12, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

Distant galaxies, stars and stellar populations are among most popular science categories.

As the Science Operations Center for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, the Space Telescope Science Institute is responsible for a multitude of activities to maximize the scientific output of the telescope. This includes coordinating the yearly call for proposals from astronomers worldwide who hope to use precious time on the telescope to carry out their scientific program of interest.

For Webb’s fifth cycle, which begins in July 2026, STScI received a record-breaking number of proposals spanning across nearly all areas of astrophysics. There’s more behind the number, though. The types of requests show astronomers are ready to answer even bolder scientific questions with the world’s premier space observatory.

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Inbox Astronomy: 'Coast' Through the Cosmos with Webb at Dulles International Airport

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'Coast' Through the Cosmos with Webb at Dulles International Airport

Release date: Thursday, November 6, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Standard Time

Whether you are flying to another city or arriving home, a can’t-miss exhibit near Washington, D.C., will put you in a state of awe — and inspire you to learn more about the universe.

Want to unwind while you are traveling to or from Dulles International Airport in Virginia? Prepare to be transported, both literally and figuratively, as you walk down the hall that connects the Metro stop and Parking Garage 1 to the main terminal, where almost 40 large-scale images from the James Webb Space Telescope are now on display. The telescope’s vivid infrared light images show expansive scenes of our universe, from galaxies and star-forming regions to dying stars and distant planets.

In the same hall, you will also find over 30 equally immersive images from the Hubble Space Telescope — and yes, we recommend taking in both. These exhibits, developed by the Office of Public Outreach at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, show the breadth and depth of Webb’s scientific discoveries since its full science operations began in July 2022. The long-term exhibits will be up until at least the end of this decade, so make a mental note to "walk through space" when you’re on site.

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Inbox Astronomy: Aging White Dwarf Still Consuming Its Planetary System

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Aging White Dwarf Still Consuming Its Planetary System

Release date: Wednesday, October 22, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Dead star seen ripping planet apart.

In approximately 5 billion years, the Sun will deplete its hydrogen fuel and collapse under its own gravity, becoming a white dwarf. Though Earth-sized, this dense remnant will retain much of the Sun’s gravitational influence.

This transformation marks the end of our solar system as we know it. Or does it?

The universe is never idle. Everything is in a perpetual state of fluctuation. Still, it came as a surprise to astronomers to find a 3 billion-year-old white dwarf actively accreting material from its former planetary system – a discovery that challenges assumptions about the late stages of stellar remnant evolution.

The telltale forensic evidence came from observations with the W. M. Keck Observatory on Maunakea in Hawaiʻi. Spectroscopic analysis of light from the dwarf found 13 chemical elements that must have come from a small rocky body – an asteroid or dwarf planet.

Like an apple falling out of a tree, some unknown gravitational disturbance within the past few million years may have sent this object spiraling inward. It was then torn apart by tidal forces and absorbed into the white dwarf’s surrounding debris disk.

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Inbox Astronomy: NASA's Webb Telescope Studies Moon-Forming Disk Around Massive Planet

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NASA's Webb Telescope Studies Moon-Forming Disk Around Massive Planet

Release date: Monday, September 29, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

The disk offers insight into how the moons of solar system gas giants like Jupiter might have formed.

Our solar system contains eight major planets, and more than 400 known moons orbiting six of these planets. Where did they all come from? There are multiple formation mechanisms. The case for large moons, like the four Galilean satellites around Jupiter, is that they condensed out of a dust and gas disk encircling the planet when it formed. But that would have happened over 4 billion years ago, and there is scant forensic evidence today.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has provided the first direct view of material in a disk around a large exoplanet, which is located over 625 light-years away. This disk is a possible construction yard for moons. Moons likely outnumber planets in our galaxy, and some might be habitats for life as we know it. So, understanding formation scenarios for moons is critical.

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Inbox Astronomy: NASA's Webb Explores Largest Star-Forming Cloud in Milky Way

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NASA's Webb Explores Largest Star-Forming Cloud in Milky Way

Release date: Wednesday, September 24, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

The galactic center is packed with star-making material — why isn’t it producing more stars? Webb could reveal long-sought answers.

Sagittarius B2 is the Milky Way galaxy’s most massive and active star forming cloud, producing half of the stars created in the galactic center region despite having only 10 percent of the area’s star-making material. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope reveals stunning new views of the region, using both its near-infrared and mid-infrared instruments, to capture both its colorful stars and gaseous stellar nurseries in unprecedented detail. Astronomers think that analysis of Webb’s data will help unravel enduring mysteries of the star formation process, and why Sagittarius B2 is forming so many more stars than the rest of the galactic center.

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Inbox Astronomy: NASA=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=Hubble Sees White Dwarf Eating Piece of Pluto-Like Object

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NASA’s Hubble Sees White Dwarf Eating Piece of Pluto-Like Object

Release date: Thursday, September 18, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Only Hubble with its unique ultraviolet vision could see this event

A celestial meal is taking place, and only the Hubble Space Telescope caught the feast in action. Just 260 light-years away — close in cosmic terms —  a burned-out star called a white dwarf is snacking on a fragment of a Pluto-like object. The Pluto analog came from the system’s own version of the Kuiper Belt, an icy ring of debris that encircles our solar system. As the exo-Pluto wandered too close to the star, the white dwarf tore it apart and began snacking on it.

Thanks to its unique ultraviolet vision, only Hubble could identify this event. Scientists using Hubble analyzed the chemical composition of the doomed object as its pieces fell onto the white dwarf. They were surprised to find water and other icy content indicating that the object came from far out in the system’s Kuiper Belt analog. Without Hubble’s ultraviolet capability, this material — unseen in visible light — would not have been detected.

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Inbox Astronomy: NASA=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=Webb Observes Immense Stellar Jet on Outskirts of Our Milky Way

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NASA’s Webb Observes Immense Stellar Jet on Outskirts of Our Milky Way

Release date: Wednesday, September 10, 2025 10:00:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time

Young Star Behaves Like a Giant Roman Candle

Way out toward the edge of our Milky Way galaxy, a young star that is still forming is sending out a birth announcement to the universe in the form of a celebratory looking firework. It's not your July 4th type. These seething twin jets of hot gasses are blazing across 8 light-years – twice the distance between our Sun and the nearest star system. Superheated gases falling onto the massive star are blasted back into space along the star’s rotational axis. Powerful magnetic fields confine the jets to narrow beams, like a Star Wars lightsaber. The James Webb Space Telescope witnessed the spectacle in infrared light. The jet is plowing into interstellar dust and gas, creating fascinating details captured only by Webb.

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