James Webb captures colorful lights of young protostar

The James Webb Space Observatory has captured new images of the extremely young protostar L1527. This star is only 100,000 years old, which is nothing compared to our Sun, which is over 4.5 billion years old. The youth of such objects is accompanied by intense activity as the future star absorbs surrounding material and, as it heats up, splashes it across the universe in the whimsical colors of a nebula.

Previously, the James Webb had already taken an image of the protostar L1527. In 2022, it captured an image using its Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam). The new image was taken with the MIRI instrument (Mid-Infrared Instrument), which can look further behind the veil of dust and gas surrounding the protostar. The image from MIRI is not as sharp and clear as from NIRCam, but it adds volume and new details to the picture.

^{NIRCam image of L1527 taken in 2022.}

If you look closely, you can see that the protostar L1527 appears to be split in half. These are the traces of the gas and dust disk around the growing star. We see it edge-on. The star draws material from it and emits energy in the process of its accretion. The central area near the protostar is saturated with ionizing radiation and appears in the image as a red flash (to which Webb's optical system adds its artifacts—eight rays).

The image of L1527, captured in 2022 by NIRCam, shows the "flash" transitioning to a white glow—this is the outflow of dust and gas driven by the star's radiation. Further, the white "explosion" continues with a blue "flame." In Webb's images, this is how the traces of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, the most abundant in the universe, appear. The star also initiates their outflow, resulting in the formation of a whimsical nebula in the shape of an hourglass. When the star accumulates its mass from the surrounding material, the accretion process will stop and take these wonderful views with it.