Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) shows a part of the Orion Nebula known as the Orion Bar.
In this region of the Orion Nebula, energetic ultraviolet light from the Trapezium Cluster — located off the upper-left corner — interacts with dense molecular clouds. The energy of the stellar radiation is slowly eroding the Orion Bar, and this has a profound effect on the molecules and chemistry in the protoplanetary disks that have formed around newborn stars here.
Within this image lies a young star system known as d203-506, which has a protoplanetary disk. Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to detect a carbon molecule known as methyl cation in that disk for the first time. That molecule is important because it aids the formation of more complex carbon-based molecules.
Learn More: www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2023/webb-makes-first-detect...
Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA, CSA, M. Zamani (ESA/Webb), and the PDRs4All ERS Team
Image Release Number: 2023-129
Image Release Date: June 26, 2023
Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) shows a part of the Orion Nebula known as the Orion Bar.
In this region of the Orion Nebula, energetic ultraviolet light from the Trapezium Cluster — located off the upper-left corner — interacts with dense molecular clouds. The energy of the stellar radiation is slowly eroding the Orion Bar, and this has a profound effect on the molecules and chemistry in the protoplanetary disks that have formed around newborn stars here.
Within this image lies a young star system known as d203-506, which has a protoplanetary disk. Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to detect a carbon molecule known as methyl cation in that disk for the first time. That molecule is important because it aids the formation of more complex carbon-based molecules.
Learn More: www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2023/webb-makes-first-detect...
Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA, CSA, M. Zamani (ESA/Webb), and the PDRs4All ERS Team
Image Release Number: 2023-129
Image Release Date: June 26, 2023