NASA posted a gorgeous image of a galaxy online each day in early October, taken with the Hubble Telescope. Futura is initially presenting two: the barred spiral galaxies NGC 685 and NGC 5068, the latter of which was also recently observed with the James Webb Space Telescope, the JWST.
It’s almost as if we’re just talking about the James Webb Space Telescope, but the venerable Hubble Telescope is still active and its legacy is very much alive, helping to realize the content of new images from the JWST as it continues revolves around looking at objects that have already been studied with Hubble. That’s why NASA took the opportunity this month of October to remind that, after more than 33 years of orbit and 1.5 million observations, the Hubble data still offers a wealth of information about the objects of our universe, or simply that they are always a source of amazement.
NASA has posted online an image of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 685, as well as images taken by Hubble and the JWST of NGC 5068, another barred spiral galaxy with thousands of star-forming regions and large amounts of interstellar dust, as explained in a press release.
Infrared and ultraviolet radiation discovered 200 years ago
The noosphere first became aware of NGC 5068 in 1785, when British astronomer William Herschel discovered it in the southern region of the constellation Virgo using what was then the largest telescope with a focal length of 12 meters. It is now known that it is about 20 million light-years from the Milky Way and has a diameter of about 45,000 light-years.
William Herschel is known not only for discovering the planet Uranus, but also for discovering the existence of infrared radiation in 1800, which he called “radiative heat.” Herschel then diffracted the sunlight with a glass prism and placed three thermometers on a table onto which the solar spectrum was projected. He moved one of the thermometers to measure the increase in temperature associated with each color of the spectrum when, to his surprise, he found that the temperature continued to rise even though the thermometer had already crossed the visible spectrum on the red color side.
Herschel would therefore not be surprised today if we told him that since its discovery in 1801 by his contemporary, the German physicist Johann Wilhelm Ritter, NGC 5068 can also be observed in the infrared and also in the ultraviolet.
In fact, in June 2023, NASA released its own infrared image of NGC 5068 taken with JWST to learn more about star formation. Young, hot stars emit ultraviolet light and, in the case of NGC 5068, Hubble has already studied them in the ultraviolet range.
Galaxies are the visible foundation of the universe; Each is a collection of stars, planets, gas, dust and dark matter held together by gravity. Hubble observations give us insights into the formation, growth and evolution of galaxies over time. To get a reasonably accurate French translation, click on the white rectangle at the bottom right. English subtitles should then appear. Then click on the nut to the right of the rectangle, then click on “Subtitles” and finally “Auto-translate”. Select “French”. © NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center