A new image captured by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) in infrared wavelengths of the Sombrero Galaxy, located about 30 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Virgo, has attracted attention. Known for its hat-like structure, the galaxy was previously observed in visible light with NASA's Hubble Telescope, where its bright core overshadowed its inner disk. But thanks to Webb's infrared sensitivity, the smooth structure of the galaxy's inner disk can be clearly observed.

However, Webb's images reveal that the dust structures in the outer ring are extremely complex and clumpy. Scientists believe that this clumpiness may point to young star formation regions. The new details offer clues to the evolution of the galaxy.

While much of the focus is on the turbulent and active regions of the Universe, the Sombrero Galaxy is relatively calm. The galaxy is very stable in terms of star formation, producing less than one solar mass of stars per year. This is quite low considering that the Milky Way produces about two solar masses of stars per year.

The supermassive black hole at the center of the Sombrero Galaxy also behaves relatively quietly. Known as an active galactic nucleus with low luminosity, it produces a small but bright jet as it slowly consumes material from the galaxy.

Image description:

A large image of the Sombrero galaxy divided into three slides. Viewed from the edge, it looks like a flat blue disk at an angle. On the first slide, the dust clumps that make up the outer ring are in the center. On the second slide, the bright core and smooth inner ring can be seen. Finally, the rough outer ring reappears on the third slide. On each slide, distant galaxies appear in the background as multicolored dots in the darkness of space. This image includes filters representing 7.7 micron light as blue, 11.3 micron light as green and 12.8 micron light as red.

 

Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STSci