You’ve seen the James Webb Space Telescope’s first full-color images, right? A stellar nursery revealing previously invisible stars, a giant exoplanet’s atmosphere examined, a group of galaxies, a beautiful planetary nebula and the deepest image of our universe ever captured.
Pretty cool, huh? But were they real?
Of course they were real!
Were they exactly as Webb captured them in one single image, like you taking a photo with your phone?
No—not at all.
Webb is designed to be sensitive to light that we cannot see. It also has four science instruments and seventeen modes.
“When you get the data down, they they don’t look anything like a beautiful color image,” said Klaus Pontoppidan, Webb project scientist at STScI, who heads-up a team of 30 expert image manipulators. “They don’t hardly look like anything at all [and] it’s only if you know what to look for that you can appreciate them.”
Webb’s engineers had to heavily manipulate the images we saw a lot before they were published, and for some pretty simple and common-sense reasons.
So what’s going on?
This is not just snapping a picture on a phone.
Planning the images
First comes the shot selection. NASA was looking for objects that would produce a nice frame, have structure and make use of color—while also highlighting science.
Webb cannot see every part of the sky at any given time. So given that the launch of the telescope was delayed multiple times, there was no way that engineers could meticulously plan the first images until Webb went to skywards last December.
When it did so, engineers had a list of about 70 targets, which were selected to demonstrate the breadth of science web was capable of, and which could herald spectacular colour images.
“Once we knew when we would be able to take the data, we could go down that list and pick the highest prioritized targets that were visible at that time,” said Pontoppidan. “The images were planned for a long time [and] there’s been a lot of work going into stimulating what the observations would look like so that everything could be configured just right.”
The Carina Nebula, as captured by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI
NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI
How Webb’s data gets back to Earth
Before engineers can get to work manipulating Webb’s images the raw data has to be returned to our planet from a million miles away in space. That’s done by using NASA JPL’s Deep Space Network (DSN), which is how engineers communicate with, and receive data from, its 30+ robotic probes in the solar system and beyond—including Webb. There are three complexes in the DSN, each placed 120º from each other; California, Madrid in Spain and Canberra in Australia.
Radio waves are very dependable, but slow. The data comes in at a ponderous couple of megabits per second (Mbps). However, the DSN will soon be upgraded from slow radio transmissions to super-fast “space lasers” that could massively increase data rates to as much as 10 or even 100 times faster.
“We plan things out, upload them to the observatory, take the data and get them back down on Earth—then we have another long period of time where we process the data,” said Pontoppidan.
Why the colors in Webb’s photos are fake
Are the Webb telescope images colorized? Are the colors in space photos real? No, they are not. The Webb telescope sees in red. It’s up there specifically to detect infrared light, the faintest and farthest light in the cosmos.
It essentially sees in heat radiation, not visible light. It sees another part of the electromagnetic spectrum:
Electromagnetic Spectrum, The Visible Range (Shaded Portion) Is Shown Enlarged On The Right. (Photo … [+] By Encyclopaedia Britannica/UIG Via Getty Images)
Universal Images Group via Getty Images
Think of a rainbow. At one end is red at the other end is blue or violet. That rainbow is, in reality, much wider, but both extremes represent the limits to what colors the human eye can perceive. Beyond blue are shorter and shorter wavelengths of light that we have no names for. Ditto beyond red, where the wavelength of light gets longer.
That’s where Webb is looking—the infrared part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
It uses masking techniques—filters—to allow it to detect faint sources of light next to very bright ones. But none of it is in “color.”
So how can the photos we see possibly be in color for us?
How Webb’s photos are colorized
Webb’s images are moved up the electromagnetic spectrum from a part we can’t perceive into the visible light part that we can see.
They take mono brightness images from Webb using up to 29 different narrowband filters, each of which detects different wavelengths of infrared light. They them assign each filter’s collected light a different visible color, from the reddest red light has the longest wavelength) to blue (which has the shortest wavelength). They then create a composite image.
Is that cheating? All the engineers are doing is taking radiation from one part of the spectrum our eyes can’t see and shifting it into another part of the spectrum we can see.
It’s like playing a song in a different key.
Besides, all cameras—including your smartphone’s camera—use filters to take the images you see. No, not Instagram filters, but individual red, green and blue filters that, when combined, produces a visible image that looks “real.”
If you think Webb’s images are not real then you also have to think that your own smartphone’s photos are fake.
Galaxy cluster SMACS 0723, known as Webb’s First Deep Field, features “spiky” stars and even … [+] galaxies.
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb ERO
How long it takes to process Webb’s images
It’s a complex process that for data from Webb just hadn’t been done before. So it takes a few weeks for each image to emerge in their full colorful glory.
“Typically, the process from raw telescope data to final, clean image that communicates scientific information about the universe can take anywhere from weeks to a month,” said Alyssa Pagan, a science visuals developer at STScI.
It was surely worth the wait.
“In the first images we have just a few days worth of observations,” said Pontoppidan. “This is really only the beginning and we’re only scratching the surface.”
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
