The James Webb Telescope has photographed the Tarantula Nebula. A closer look at how stars are born.

Here’s another great image from the new James Webb Space Telescope for NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency. The image shows 30 Doradus, also called the Tarantula Nebula, which is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud about 161,000 light-years away from us. The image spans 340 light-years and shows, among other things, thousands of young stars that have not been photographed before. NASA writes about the photo:

In this mosaic image spanning 340 light-years across, the near-infrared webcam (NIRCam) displays the star-forming region of the Tarantula Nebula in new light, including tens of thousands of previously unseen young stars surrounded by cosmic dust. The most active region appears to be shimmering with massive young stars appearing pale blue.”

One of astronomers’ hopes for the new images provided by James Webb is to better understand how stars form. ESA writes in a press release:

“Despite thousands of years of star-gazing, the process of star formation still holds many mysteries—many due to our previous inability to obtain clear images of what was happening behind the thick clouds of stellar nurseries. Webb has already begun to reveal the universe of It’s never been seen before, and we’re only beginning to rewrite the story of astral creation.”

Below is an image of the Tarantula Nebula captured by the Hubble telescope in 2004 for comparison.