James Webb Space Telescope captures stunning image of 'Ring Nebula'

Western University researchers have captured some new images of ‘Ring Nebula’ in the Lyra constellation from the James Webb Telescope (JWST).

The Ring Nebula is a planetary nebula, which features remnants of dying stars that release much of their mass at the end of their lives.

“I first saw the Ring Nebula as a kid through just a small telescope,” said Western astrophysicist Jan Cami, a core member of JWST Ring Nebula Imaging Project. “I would never have thought that one day I would be part of the team that would use the most powerful space telescope ever built to look at this object.”

According to Western, the new images offer an “unparalleled chance to understand nebulae” — a giant cloud of dust and gas in space.

“Scientifically, I am very interested to learn how a star turns its gaseous envelope into this mixture of simple and complex molecules and dust grains, and these new observations will help us figure that out,” said Cami.

The international research team analyzing these images includes researchers from the U.K., France, Canada, U.S., Sweden, Spain, Brazil, Ireland and Belgium.

JWST is a joint collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.