NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured a stunning image of the starburst galaxy M82 in 2006. The image revealed a small box at the galaxy’s core, which was captured by the NIRCam instrument on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. In the Webb image, red filaments were visible, tracing the shape of the galactic wind.
The collaboration between NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, and A. Bolatto from the University of Maryland helped capture these images. The filters used for these images were F814W, F658N, F555W, and F435W for the Hubble image and F335M, F250M, and F164N for the Webb image. The different wavelengths of light were represented by different colors – light at .814 microns was colored red in both images, .658 microns was red-orange in the Hubble image and green in the Webb image, .555 microns was green in both images, and .435 microns was blue in both images.
These stunning images provided insight into the galaxy’s structure and dynamics.
