James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)den plass observatory designed to conduct infrared astronomy and launched successfully on 25 December 2021 will enable two research teams to study earliest galaxies in the univers. The research teams will use JWST’s powerful instruments (NIRISS, NIRCam and NIRSpec) to capture and characterize some of the earliest galaxies.
The Next Generation Deep Extragalactic Exploratory Public (NGDEEP) Survey will target Hubble Ultra Deep Field by pointing telescope’s Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS) on the primary Hubble Ultra Deep Field and Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) on the parallel field. The two instruments NIRISS and NIRCam will capture infrared light (redshifted due to expansion of univers). The data will be released immediately to benefit the researchers.
NGDEEP team will also identify metal elements in the early galaxies especially in smaller and dimmer ones that haven’t yet been thoroughly studied so far. Study of metal contents of galaxies is standard way to trace evolution across cosmic time. There were only hydrogen and helium in the beginning of the univers. New elements were formed by successive generations of stjerner. Studying metal contents of galaxies will help to plot out precisely when various elements existed and update models that project how galaxies evolved in the early univers.
The other research team will examine the primary Hubble Ultra Deep Field using the microshutter array within the telescope’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec). This will provide first large sample of earliest galaxies that existed in the early univers enabling researchers to understand them in detail.
The story of study of tidlig univers began in 1995 with the decision to focus Hubble Rom Telescope (HST) on nothing in the hitherto unexplored field in the sky. Hubble captured about 3000 images of galaxies at different stages of stellar evolution. Better known as Hubble Deep Field, these images were first pictures of early galaxies and revolutionised the field of astronomy.
As a successor of Hubble plass telescope (HST), James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is carrying forward the Hubble telescope’s legacy in the area of study of early univers. Webb telescope aims to search for light from the first stjerner and galaxies that formed in the Universe after the Big Bang to study the formation and evolution of galaxies, to understand the formation of stjerner og planet systems and to study planet systems and the origins of life.
Den tidlige univers in the first several hundred million years after the big bang was a very different place. It was semi-opaque. This is when the first galaxies in the univers were beginning to form. Many distant galaxies have been spotted by the telescopes but none earlier than 400 million years after the big bang. What were galaxies that existed even earlier like? The above mentioned, two research teams will answer just this by revealing details of the earliest chapters of galakse utvikling.
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kilder:
- NASA 2022. NASAs Webb to Uncover Riches of the Early Universe, publisert 22. juni 2022. Tilgjengelig online på https://webbtelescope.org/contents/news-releases/2022/news-2022-015.html Tilgang 23. juni 2022.
- Prasad U., 2021. James Webb Space Telescope (JWST): Det første romobservatoriet dedikert til studiet av det tidlige universet. Vitenskapelig europeisk. Publisert 6. november 2021. Tilgjengelig på nett på http://scientificeuropean.co.uk/sciences/space/james-webb-space-telescope-jwst-the-first-space-observatory-dedicated-to-the-study-of-early-universe/
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