Cosmology has taken a giant leap in recent months. Until now, the Kitt Peak Observatory, located in the Sonora desert, Arizona, was the most widely used for space observation. With its DESI (Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument) telescope, it has been the protagonist of numerous discoveries. Although it is currently closed, the access is limited. Space science has not stopped investigating the origin of the Milky Way. The new release is the COSMOS-Web map. The most interactive, deep and complete map up to date has been made by he James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Access is free and anyone can interact with it and help specialists solve the puzzles have revealed new images of thousands of galaxies.
COSMOS-Web Map
This project stems from the union of James Webb Telescope and COSMOS. Scientists Caitlin Casey from UC Santa Barbara and Heyhan Kartaltepe from the Rochester Institute of Technology led this project. They were able to expand what was already known thanks to the Hubble Telescope, through the James Webb Telescope. Casey stated that “”Our goal was to build this deep space field on a physical scale that would far surpass anything done before”. So much so that the map contains 800,000 galaxies and corners of the Universe never seen before.
Cosmic Dawn and JWST
The Big Bang took place 13.8 billion years ago. A billion years later came the Cosmic Dawn, of which very little data is available. This is an extremely remote area, which due to the expansion of space is increasingly farther away. The light that is able to reach us is so dim that it makes visibility difficult. That’s why the JWST has been a revolution in the world of astronomy.
The JWST has such advanced technology that it allows you to see what Hubble was not able to show. It is able to find dim light that throws us information about the creation of the Universe. All this through its infrared capabilities and high resolution.The COSMOS-Web map gives researchers the ability to search for complete ecosystems that span the entire universe, as well as the interaction between its components. This is possible because the map reveals an area of 7.5 full moons and is located 13.5 billion years in the past.
New Space discoveries
It is the first time that such clear and distant images have been accessed, so new findings or paradigm shifts are assured. Casey explained that “the big surprise is that with JWST, we see about ten times more galaxies than expected at these incredible distances. We also see supermassive black holes that are not even visible with Hubble”. What does this mean? That with what we know so far about the evolution of galaxies, it would be impossible for so many galaxies to have formed after the Big Bang, by a question of time. These new findings are blowing researchers’ heads off. They find no sense to the data and do not stop trying to decipher the enigma. Do you think that you could solve it? Access to the COSMOS-Web map is free and for everyone, so that curious and amateur researchers can consult it and perhaps solve these puzzles.
“The best science is really done when everyone thinks about the same data set differently. It’s not just for a group of people to discover the mysteries”, stated Casey. The truth is that with all this information on the table, Cosmologists, those interested in matter and anyone can access it and travel through space and time from our purest origins. Could you resist taking a look?
Have scientists discover the contents of black holes?
