Webb telescope finds strange discovery in deep space: alcohol

The powerful eye of the James Webb Space Telescope has detected biochemical substances around two young stars.

Astronomers at the space observatory, which orbits a million miles from Earth, have focused on the cosmic regions around these protostars, which are so young that they have not yet formed planets. But it almost certainly will: NASA suspects that almost every star has at least one planet.

In these planet-forming regions, the Webb telescope found “complex organic molecules,” including ethanol (the alcohol found in alcoholic beverages) as well as another element found in vinegar. More importantly, these components, which form as icy materials in frozen space, may one day become part of future solar system objects, including large space rocks that can carry organic molecules and important materials to planets. (A lot of Earth waterfor example, may have come from asteroid impacts.)

“All of these particles could become part of comets, asteroids and eventually new planetary systems when icy material is transported inward into the planet-forming disk as the protostellar system evolves,” Eoin van Dischhoek, an astronomer at Leiden University and author of the new research, said. In a NASA statement. “We look forward to following this astrochemical path step by step with more Webb data in the coming years.”

The new research has been accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed journal Astronomy and astrophysics.

The Webb telescope carries instruments, called spectrometers, that can detect the composition of distant objects or places, such as the atmospheres of alien planets. Spectrographs separate the light coming from these objects, similar to a prism. Different elements or molecules absorb different types of light, so the light Webb sees can distinguish which chemicals are present and which are not.

The first graphic below shows the different spectra of light captured by Webb while surveying the distant protostar IRAS 2A. Ethanol was present in various groups of glacial materials.

The chemical-rich space region around the protostar IRAS 23385.
Image credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/W. Rocha (Leiden University)

NASA explained that in addition to alcohol, the Webb telescope identified formic acid, methane, and possible acetic acid. These are “the essential ingredients for making potentially habitable worlds,” the space agency said.

A habitable world is one that harbors conditions that can support life, although this almost does not mean that there is life there. NASA is currently searching for potentially habitable worlds, some of which might resemble Earth covered in oceans.

Powerful Webb Telescope capabilities

The Webb Telescope — a scientific collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency — is designed to peer into the deepest universe and reveal new insights into the early universe. But it also looks at interesting planets in our galaxy, along with planets and moons in our solar system.

Here’s how Webb achieved unparalleled feats that will likely last for decades:

– Giant mirror: The Webb Mirror, which captures the light, is more than 21 feet wide. This is two and a half times larger than the Hubble Space Telescope’s mirror. Capturing more light allows Webb to see more ancient objects far away. As shown above, the telescope looks at stars and galaxies that formed more than 13 billion years ago, a few hundred million years after the Big Bang.

In 2021, “we will see the first stars and galaxies ever formed,” Jan Creighton, an astronomer and director of the Manfred Olson Planetarium at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, told Mashable.

– Infrared display: Unlike Hubble, which sees light largely visible to us, Webb is primarily an infrared telescope, meaning it sees light in the infrared spectrum. This allows us to see more of the universe. Infrared has longer Wavelengths of visible light, so light waves slip more efficiently through cosmic clouds; Light often neither strikes nor is scattered by these densely packed particles. Ultimately, Webb’s infrared sight could penetrate places where Hubble cannot.

“It lifts the veil,” Creighton said.

– Looking at distant exoplanets: As mentioned earlier, the Webb telescope It carries specialized equipment called spectrometers It would revolutionize our understanding of these distant worlds. The instruments can decipher molecules (such as water, carbon dioxide and methane) present in the atmospheres of distant exoplanets, whether they are gas giants or smaller rocky worlds. Webb will look at exoplanets in the Milky Way. Who knows what we will find?

“We may learn things we never thought about,” said Mercedes Lopez Morales, an exoplanet researcher and astrophysicist at Center for Astrophysics at Harvard and Smithsonian UniversityIn 2021, he told Mashable.

Astronomers have already succeeded in finding interesting chemical reactions on a planet 700 light-years away, and as shown above, the observatory has begun to look at one of the most unlikely places in the universe: rocky, Earth-sized planets in the TRAPPIST solar system. System.