The spiral galaxy and stars seen in the James Webb space telescope image of NGC 4535, 50 million light-years away in the constellation Virgo, are only part of the scene.

The bright red and orange knots on the outer edges of the galaxy's arms are easy to spot; these are areas of star formation. By analysing mid-infrared light, the Webb telescope highlights gas and dust, the key components of active star formation.

Do these spiralling images make you feel like you're being sucked in too?

Image Description:

Webb's image of NGC 4535 shows a dense barred spiral galaxy with a light orange haze in the centre. In the region near the centre, the bar structure is surrounded by a blue haze of stars forming a vertical oval shape that extends across most of the frame. Filaments of glowing dust cross the bar and connect to two prominent spiral arms of stars, gas and dust. These arms start from the centre with lines curving from top to right and form an arc curving from bottom right to top left, forming an elongated S-shape. The spiral arms rotate clockwise and appear in various shades from dark orange to bright orange, with the brightest regions at the edges. There are also some bright blue points of light scattered throughout the image, these are stars and star clusters scattered throughout the galaxy. In darker areas, it is easier to spot brighter and larger points of light, some of which are blue, some of which are pink in colour and more oval in appearance at the edges.