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Zoom to See Terzan 5 Near Our Milky Way Galaxy’s Bulge

Zoom in to Terzan 5, a star cluster that lies within the crowded central region of our Milky Way galaxy known as the bulge.

The scene starts with a ground-based image of our Milky Way bulge and zooms in on and circles Terzan 5, ending with the composite image of the star system from the James Webb and Hubble Space Telescopes.

The Milky Way is shaped like a giant fried egg. The yolk in the middle is the galactic bulge, a crowded region packed with ancient stars of various masses and brightnesses. It’s also home to a number of globular star clusters that formed early in our galaxy’s history, which typically have only one ancient star population. In contrast, Terzan 5 was recently reclassified as a bulge fossil fragment because it has four generations of stars and has maintained its separate identity.

  • Release Date
    June 16, 2026
  • Science Release
    NASA Webb, Hubble Reveal History of Relic of Milky Way’s Formation
    Read the release
  • Credit
    Video: NASA, ESA, CSA, Alyssa Pagan (STScI); Acknowledgment: ESO, Pan-STARRS, DSS2, Akira Fujii

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Related Images & Videos

A dramatically crowded starfield that looks like a just-shaken snow globe. The black background of space, which is clearer at the edges, is covered by thousands of tiny white, orange, and blue points of light, which are stars. The stars are most concentrated in the center, forming a roughly circular orb, and sparser at the edges of the image. Several larger orange stars, particularly those largest near the edges of the frame, have prominent diffraction spikes.

Bulge Fossil Fragment Terzan 5 (Webb and Hubble Image)

New observations from Webb combined with multiple observations from Hubble prove that Terzan 5 is a self-contained, self-enriching stellar system that contains up to four distinct star populations. It orbits within our Milky Way galaxy’s central bulge.

Image titled u201cJames Webb and Hubble Space Telescopes; Terzan 5,u201d with compass arrows and color key. A dramatically crowded starfield that looks like a just-shaken snow globe. The black background of space is covered by thousands of tiny white, orange, and blue points of light, which are stars. The stars are most concentrated in the center, forming a roughly circular orb. At the bottom left are compass arrows indicating the orientation of the image on the sky. The east arrow points toward 12 ou2019clock. The north arrow points toward 3 ou2019clock. At the bottom right is a scale bar labeled 2 light-years. The length of the scale bar is about one seventh of the total image. Below the image is a color key showing which Hubble ACS/WFC and Webb NIRCam filters were used to create the image, and which visible-light color is assigned to each filter. Hubble ACS filters, from left to right: F606W is blue and F814W is teal. Webb NIRCam filters: F115W is orange, F200W is red.

Terzan 5 (Webb and Hubble Compass Image)

This image of bulge fossil fragment Terzan 5 was captured by the James Webb and Hubble space telescopes. Webb’s data are from its NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) and Hubble’s from its Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). The image shows a scale bar, compass arrows, and co...

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Details

Last Updated
Jun 15, 2026
Location
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Contact
Media

Laura Betz
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
laura.e.betz@nasa.gov

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