Distant Starbursts

Published 2 hours ago
Source: theatlantic.com
Distant Starbursts
Two small clumps of bright stars appear in the center of a small irregular galaxy, surrounded by a faint cloud of dust, and backdropped by many other distant galaxies.
ESA / Webb, NASA, CSA, A. Hirschauer, M. Meixner et al.

Day 17 of the 2025 Space Telescope Advent Calendar: Distant Starbursts. Last year, the James Webb Space Telescope made this observation of a dwarf irregular galaxy named I Zwicky 18, some 59 million light-years away from Earth. At the heart of the galaxy are two major star-forming regions surrounded by clouds of gas that have been sculpted by the stellar winds of the hot, young stars.

See the full advent calendar here, where a new image will be revealed each day until December 25.