JADES Transients (NIRCam Image)

stsci_2024-122b June 10th, 2024

Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Christa DeCoursey (U Arizona) Image processing: Alyssa Pagan (STScI)

This mosaic displays three of about 80 transients, or objects of changing brightness, identified in data from the JADES (JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey) program. Most of the transients are the result of exploding stars or supernovae. By comparing images taken in 2022 and 2023, astronomers could locate supernovae that, from our perspective, recently exploded (like the examples shown in the first two columns), or supernovae that had already exploded and whose light was fading away (third column).

The age of each supernova can be determined from its redshift (designated by ‘z’). The light of the most distant supernova, at a redshift of 3.8, originated when the universe was only 1.7 billion years old. A redshift of 2.845 corresponds to a time 2.3 billion years after the big bang. The closest example, at a redshift of 0.655, shows light that left its galaxy about 6 billion years ago, when the universe was just over half its current age.

Provider: Space Telescope Science Institute

Image Source: https://webbtelescope.org/contents/news-releases/2024/news-2024-122

Curator: STScI, Baltimore, MD, USA

Image Use Policy: https://www.stsci.edu/copyright