Webb Science Theme

Star Lifecycle

Webb is advancing our understanding of the life cycles of stars, from star birth and planet formation to star death, wherein matter is released back into space, allowing new stars and planets to form from their remnants.

Key Questions

Key Findings / Discoveries

Introduction: Star Lifecycle

In Depth: What is Webb Studying?

Latest Images

Latest Research

Related Webb Science

Key Questions

Building on the established science from previous missions, scientists from around the world are using the Webb Telescope to advance our knowledge for these key questions.

How do clouds of gas and dust collapse to form stars?

Why do most stars form in groups?

How do planetary systems form?

How do the heavy elements stars produce get recycled into new generations of stars and planets?

How did the first generations of stars form in the early universe?

How much did the universe’s early stars deviate from the life cycles we are familiar with today?

What role did black holes play in the evolution of stars in galaxies like our own Milky Way?

Key Findings / Discoveries : Star Lifecycle

01

Locating a Former Star That Exploded as a Supernova

Astronomers looked through Webb (as well as Hubble) data of Galaxy NGC 1637, and were able to pinpoint a single red supergiant star located exactly where the supernova was spotted in June of 2025. This is the first time Webb data has been used to find a supernova progenitor, though scientists had been waiting for a chance to look for a supernova to explode in a galaxy Webb had already observed.

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02

New views of the Helix planetary nebula, formed by a dying Sun-like star

Webb captured a new close-up of an old favorite, the Helix Nebula. We've seen this region before, but Webb zooms into this dying star with a deeper, more detailed view of blistering winds of hot gas crashing into colder shells of dust and gas that were shed earlier in the star's life.

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03

Identifying the Earliest Supernova to Date

Teamwork makes the dream work! Webb confirmed the earliest supernova to date; this dying star exploded when the universe was only 730 million years old. Webb’s sharp infrared capability also allowed astronomers to locate the supernova’s very faint and distant host galaxy. Webb supported a whole chain of observations of international telescopes which began when a rare and super bright flash of light, called a gamma-ray burst (GRB), occurred in mid-March 2025.

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04

Defining structure in the chaos

Webb refined our view of a star system called Apep, named after the Egyptian god of chaos. Apep was thought to consist solely of two Wolf-Rayet stars, which are a rare class of massive, evolved, luminous stars. Only 1000 are estimated to exist in our galaxy, out of hundreds of billions of stars. To have found a system with two of them is exceedingly rare, and it’s the only known one in our galaxy. Adding to the chaos, Webb confirmed that there is actually a third star in this system, a massive supergiant, which is slicing holes into the dusty shells the Wolf-Rayet stars are creating.

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05

Better understanding massive star formation

Webb caught enormous jets of seething gases erupting from a monster baby star (10 times more massive than our Sun) moving at hundreds of thousands of miles per hour, stretching across 8 light-years of space, approximately twice the distance between our Sun and the next-nearest stars in the Alpha Centauri system. Newly forming stars can build up infalling gas, which is then blasted out along the star’s spin axis, likely due to the influence of its magnetic fields. We’ve observed this phenomenon before in lower mass stars, but spotting a star and jet of this scale is rare. Astronomers disagree on how massive stars form. This star seems to support the theory that massive stars have a stable disk of material around them, as evidenced by the jets being 180 degrees apart from each other.

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06

Starbirth in the Pismis 24 star cluster

In the center of this cluster, newborn stars form within clouds of dust and gas, shining through the nebula in the infrared. Two massive stars at the center are blasting out scorching radiation and stellar winds that are carving a cavity into the wall of the star-forming nebula clouds. Their fierce forces are shaping and compressing spires in the glowing gas at the bottom of the scene causing new stars to form. Pismis 24 is one of the closest sites of massive star birth, giving scientists rare insight into the properties of hot young stars and how they evolve.

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07

Unprecedented views of the detail and structure of ejections of gas and dust from actively forming stars

High-resolution near-infrared light captured by Webb showed incredible new detail and structure within the lobes of the ejections emitted by two actively forming stars, including asymmetrical lines that appear to run into one another. L483 is 650 light-years away in the constellation Serpens.

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08

Finding the lower mass limits of so-called “failed stars” found in star-forming regions

Webb recently observed brown dwarfs in the Flame Nebula. Decades of Hubble data were crucial in identifying brown dwarf candidates for further study, essentially handing the baton to Webb to take an in-depth look at this region. Scientists using Webb were looking for the lower mass limit of brown dwarfs, and think they have found it, at 2-3 times the mass of Jupiter. Webb is powerful enough that it can observe objects at even lower masses, down to 0.5 Jupiter masses, but it didn’t find any objects of smaller mass. The value of 2-3 Jupiter masses could potentially be the lower mass limit of objects formed by stellar mechanisms and thus the lowest mass limit of brown dwarfs.

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09

The effects of strong magnetic fields on star-formation in the central part of our galaxy

Follow-up research on a 2023 image of the Sagittarius C stellar nursery in the heart of our Milky Way galaxy, captured by Webb, has revealed ejections from still-forming protostars and insights into the impact of strong magnetic fields on interstellar gas and the life cycle of stars.

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At the center is a thin vertical cloud known as Lynds 483 that is shaped like an hourglass with irregular edges. At lower center are two discrete bright white, tiny blobs of light that have raced away from the hidden central stars. The top lobe shows a more prominent orange U-shape. Orange bleeds into light purple, and brighter pink at its edges. Some background stars are visible through sections of this lobe. Higher up, there is an orange arc. Some brighter pink material extends to the top edges near the center. In the lower lobe, less orange is visible. More opaque light purple is in its top third, rippling out into semi-transparent blues and pinks. The lower lobe has more texture. V-shapes left and right of the lobes are darkest, and the background stars in these areas appear orange. Elsewhere, the black background of space is clearer, speckled with tiny white stars and faint orange galaxies.

Shimmering ejections emitted by two actively forming stars make up Lynds 483 (L483). High-resolution near-infrared light captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope shows incredible new detail and structure within these lobes, including asymmetrical lines that appear to run into one another. L483 is 650 light-years away in the constellation Serpens.

NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Introduction: Star Lifecycle

Although stars have been the main topic of astronomy for thousands of years, we have begun to understand them in detail only in recent times through the advent of powerful telescopes and computers.

A hundred years ago, scientists did not know that stars are powered by nuclear fusion, and 50 years ago they did not know that stars are continually forming in the Universe. 35 years ago, we did not know that there were planets around other stars. Researchers still do not know the details of how clouds of gas and dust collapse to form stars, or why most stars form in groups, or exactly how planetary systems form. Young stars within a star-forming region interact with each other in complex ways. The details of how they evolve and release the heavy elements they produce back into space for recycling into new generations of stars and planets remains to be determined through a combination of observation and theory.

The Star Lifecycle in Four Images:

Stars are born in massive clouds of dust and gas, eventually becoming stable nuclear fusion engines existing for millions to billions of years. As the hydrogen fuel runs out they begin to collapse and shed their outer layers, some massive types explode, all spread and recycle their elements into the universe for further star creation. See Star Lifecycle Basics for a more detailed description. This lifecycle is captured in the four image slideshow below, the buttons to advance it are on the lower right of the images.

The image is divided horizontally by an undulating line between a cloudscape forming a nebula along the bottom portion and a comparatively clear upper portion. Speckled across both portions is a starfield, showing innumerable stars of many sizes. The smallest of these are small, distant, and faint points of light. The largest of these appear larger, closer, brighter, and more fully resolved with 8-point diffraction spikes. The upper portion of the image is blueish, and has wispy translucent cloud-like streaks rising from the nebula below. The orangish cloudy formation in the bottom half varies in density and ranges from translucent to opaque. The stars vary in color, the majority of which have a blue or orange hue. The cloud-like structure of the nebula contains ridges, peaks, and valleys � an appearance very similar to a mountain range. Three long diffraction spikes from the top right edge of the image suggest the presence of a large star just out of view. — Stellar Nursery
The Carina Nebula (captured here by Webb's NIRCam) is a star forming region of gas and dust where protostars are born of raw material condensed by gravity and heated by friction.
NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

A growing protostar embedded within a molecular cloud. The center of the image shows a bright, red region, where the growing protostar resides, with a thin, gray lane of matter cutting through it horizontally, which is the protostar’s accretion disk. Above and below this region are blue triangular-shaped molecular clouds, which give the overall object an hourglass shape. The areas in the molecular clouds closest to the protostar have more pronounced plumes of blue gas. There are red, yellow, orange, blue, and green stars and galaxies scattered across the background. — A Protostar is Born
L1527, shown in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument), is a molecular cloud that harbors a protostar. It resides about 460 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. The more diffuse blue light and the filamentary structures in the image come from organic compounds known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), while the red at the center of this image is an energized, thick layer of gases and dust that surrounds the protostar. The region in between, which shows up in white, is a mixture of PAHs, ionized gas, and other molecules.
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Satellite Observes Large Solar Eruption — A "Main Sequence" Star
New stars come in a variety of sizes and colors. They range from blue to red, from less than half the size of our Sun to over 20 times the Sun’s size. Our Sun (captured here by the GOES satellite) is a medium-sized star. Star size all depends on how much gas and dust is collected during the star’s formation. The more mass a star starts out with, the brighter and hotter it will be. For a star, everything depends on its mass. Throughout their lives, stars fight the inward pull of the force of gravity. It is only the outward pressure created by the nuclear reactions pushing away from the star's core that keeps the star "intact." But these nuclear reactions require fuel, in particular hydrogen. Eventually, on the order of millions to billions of years, the supply of hydrogen runs out and the star begins its demise.
GOES MIssion NOAA/NASA

The Crab Nebula. An oval nebula with complex structure against a black background. On the nebula’s exterior, particularly at the top left and bottom left, lie curtains of glowing red and orange fluffy material. Its interior shell shows large-scale loops of mottled filaments of yellow-white and green, studded with clumps and knots. Translucent thin ribbons of smoky white lie within the remnant’s interior, brightest toward its center. The white material follows different directions throughout, including sometimes sharply curving away from certain regions within the remnant. A faint, wispy ring of white material encircles the very center of the nebula. Around and within the supernova remnant are many points of blue, red, and yellow light. — Star Death and Recycling Its Elements
Throughout their lives, stars fight the inward pull of the force of gravity. It is only the outward pressure created by the nuclear reactions pushing away from the star's core that keeps the star "intact." But these nuclear reactions require fuel, in particular hydrogen. Eventually, on the order of millions to billions of years, the supply of hydrogen runs out and the star begins its demise. How a star ends its life depends on its mass. The Sun will expand and contract, shedding its layers in the process. Stars much more massive than our Sun end their lives in a supernova explosion. As these stars release matter back into space, they are spreading the elements that were created by their fusion processes, and allowing new stars and planetary systems to form from their remnants. This image by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) and MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) captures a supernova remnant comprised of several different components, including doubly ionized sulfur (represented in red-orange), ionized iron (blue), dust (yellow-white and green), and synchrotron emission (white).
Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, T. Temim (Princeton University).

Related Information

In Depth: What is Webb Studying and How?

Star Lifecycle

Today we know that stars are the essential sources of raw material in the universe, recycling and distributing the elemental building blocks of everything we observe: new stars, nebulae of gas and dust, planets, and even humans. All life on Earth contains the element carbon, and all carbon was originally formed in the core of a star.

Stars populate the universe with elements through their life cycle — an ongoing process of formation, consuming fuel, and dispersal of material when all the fuel is used up. Different stars take different paths, however, depending on how much matter they contain — their mass. A star’s mass depends on how much gas is brought together by gravity during its formation. We measure the mass of stars by how they compare to the “parent star” of our system, the Sun. Stars are considered high mass when they are a few times more massive than the Sun.

When high-mass stars have no more fuel to generate outward energy, their iron cores begin to collapse until the pressure overcomes the inward push of gravity and they explode in a spectacular supernova, dispersing elements into space to recombine as future stars, planets, asteroids, or even eventually life like us.

After a supernova explosion, massive stars can go one of two ways. If the remnant core of the star is less massive, it will collapse into a very small, very dense core of neutrons called a neutron star. If the remnant is more massive, gravity overwhelms the neutrons and the star collapses completely into a black hole — so-called because the matter within it is so compressed and gravity is so intense that not even light can escape.

Infographic showing possible paths of the stellar life cycle, with two main pathways: Sun-like Stars (left) and Massive Stars (right). Both paths begin and end with a red cloud labeled "Star-Forming Nebula." The Sun-like Star path runs counterclockwise from "Star-Forming Nebula" in the middle to "Protostars," then "Sun-like Star," then "Red Giant," and then to “Planetary Nebula." Two paths lead off from "Planetary Nebula," one to "White Dwarf" and the other back to "Star-Forming Nebula." The Massive Star path runs clockwise from "Star-Forming Nebula" to "Protostars," then "Massive Star," then "Red Supergiant," and then to "Supernova." Three paths lead off from "Supernova": "Black Hole," "Neutron Star," and "Star-Forming Nebula." The Sun-like Star path is longer than the Massive Star path. Labels along the paths indicate that the time between the formation of a Sun-like star and a Red Giant star is billions of years, and the time between the formation of a massive star and a Red Supergiant is millions of years

A star's life is a constant struggle against the force of gravity. Gravity constantly works to try and cause the star to collapse. The star's core, however, is very hot, which creates pressure within the gas. This pressure counteracts the force of gravity, putting the star into what is called hydrostatic equilibrium. A star is okay as long as the star has this equilibrium between gravity pulling the star inwards and pressure pushing the star outwards. During most of a star's lifetime, the interior heat and radiation is provided by nuclear reactions in the star's core. This phase of the star's life is called the main sequence. Before a star reaches the main sequence, the star is contracting and its core is not yet hot or dense enough to begin nuclear reactions. So, until it reaches the main sequence, hydrostatic support is provided by the heat generated from the contraction. At some point, the star will run out of material in its core for those nuclear reactions. When the star runs out of nuclear fuel, it comes to the end of its time on the main sequence. If the star is large enough, it can go through a series of less-efficient nuclear reactions to produce internal heat. However, eventually these reactions will no longer generate sufficient heat to support the star against its own gravity and the star will collapse.

NASA, Night Sky Network

Planetary System Formation

Once we thought planets around other stars were rare. Now we know they are not the exception, they are the rule. Most stars in the universe are surrounded by planetary systems. Webb’s infrared sensitivity makes it uniquely suited for studying how planetary systems are formed, as well as being able to tell us about the characteristics of the planets themselves.

The stages of planetary system formation are illustrated below: starting with a protostar embedded in a gas cloud (upper left of diagram), to an early star with a circumstellar disk (upper right), to a star surrounded by small "planetesimals" which are starting to clump together (lower left) to a solar system like ours today.

The stages of planetary system formation.

Shu et al. 1987

The continual discovery of new and unusual planetary systems has made scientists re-think their ideas and theories about how planets are formed. Scientists realize that to get a better understanding of how planets form, they need to have more observations of planets around young stars, and more observations of leftover debris around stars, which can come together and form planets.

Brown Dwarfs

Webb is also revealing more about brown dwarfs, cosmic objects that are like a bridge between planets and stars. Brown dwarfs are not massive enough for their cores to sustain hydrogen fusion like full-fledged stars do, but their formation process is like that of stars, not planets. Observing star and planet formation stages may help explain how and why some masses of matter become small stars, others gas giant planets, and some brown dwarfs.

Brown dwarfs are dim and much cooler than stars, and thus difficult to observe. When they are very young, however, they are still relatively warmer and brighter than the obscuring, dense dust and gas that surrounds them. Webb’s extreme sensitivity to infrared light can pierce these dense, dusty regions and see the faint infrared glow from young brown dwarfs.

Webb observed brown dwarfs in the Flame Nebula. Decades of Hubble data were crucial in identifying brown dwarf candidates for further study, essentially handing the baton to Webb to take an in-depth look at this region. Scientists using Webb were looking for the lower mass limit of brown dwarfs, and think they have found it, at 2-3 times the mass of Jupiter. Webb is powerful enough that it can observe objects at even lower masses, down to 0.5 Jupiter masses, but it didn’t find any objects of smaller mass. The value of 2-3 Jupiter masses could potentially be the lower mass limit of objects formed by stellar mechanisms and thus the lowest mass limit of brown dwarfs.

A collage of four images showing a dusty nebula. Two-thirds of the collage is taken up by a single image of the nebula, while the remaining third shows three insets stacked on top of each other. In the largest image at left, there is an orange and yellow fang-like cloud of matter that cuts the image in two. The left side of the fang shows more clouds of a dark brown shade, while the right shows filaments of light brown. There are a number of bright blue and red points of light spread throughout, three of which are circled in white and labeled with a number from one to three. Circle 1 is located at about 12 o’clock in the middle of the fang-like cloud, while Circle 2 is at about 5 o’clock and Circle 3 is located at about 7 o’clock, toward the bottom left of the image. Each circle magnifies an individual object, which is shown in each of the three squares to the right of the collage, labeled 1 to 3 from top to bottom. Each image contains a single, fuzzy point of light in the middle.

This near-infrared image of a portion of the Flame Nebula from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope highlights three low-mass objects, seen in the insets to the right. These objects, which are much colder than protostars, require the sensitivity of Webb’s instruments to detect them. These objects were studied as part of an effort to explore the lowest mass limit of brown dwarfs within the Flame Nebula. The Webb images represent light at wavelengths of 1.15 microns and 1.4 microns (filters F115W and F140M) as blue, 1.82 microns (F182M) as green, 3.6 microns (F360M) as orange, and 4.3 microns (F430M) as red.

NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, M. Meyer (University of Michigan)

Webb is giving scientists insights into how planets form in dusty disks around young stars. Webb discovered evidence that planet-forming disks in the early universe are longer-lived than they should be, given the conditions in their environment.

The center of the image contains arcs of orange and pink that form a boat-like shape. One end of these arcs points to the top right of the image, while the other end point toward the bottom left. Another plume of orange and pink expands from the center to the top left of the image. To the right of this plume is a large cluster of white stars. There are various other white stars and a few galaxies of different sizes spread throughout the image. Ten, small, yellow circles overlaid at various points across the image indicate the positions of the ten stars surveyed in this study.

This is a James Webb Space Telescope image of NGC 346, a massive star cluster in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy that is one of the Milky Way's nearest neighbors. With its relative lack of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, the NGC 346 cluster serves as a nearby proxy for studying stellar environments with similar conditions in the early, distant universe. Ten, small, yellow circles overlaid on the image indicate the positions of the ten stars surveyed in this study.

NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Olivia C. Jones (UK ATC), Guido De Marchi (ESTEC), Margaret Meixner (USRA)

Webb's Infrared Capabilities

Seeing Inside The Veiled Regions of Dust and Gas Where Stars are Born

To unravel the birth and early evolution of stars and planets, we need to be able to peer into the hearts of dense and dusty cloud cores where star formation begins, like the Pillars of Creation (below). These regions cannot be observed at visible light wavelengths as the dust scatters visible light and makes such regions opaque. They must be observed at infrared wavelengths to see within them.

Hubble is optimized to observe the universe in visible light but has some near infrared capability. Below is a comparison of Hubble's visible and near infra-red view of the Pillars of Creation that illustrates this concept. In the infrared more structure within the dust clouds is revealed and hidden stars have now become apparent. Webb is Hubble's successor, optimized for near-infrared and mid-infrared light which allows us to see regions previously unseen - answering questions, advancing science, and asking new questions.

visible light

Near Infrared

Hubble Revisits the Famous 'Pillars of Creation' to Celebrate 25th Anniversary

WFPC2 image: NASA, ESA, STScI, and J. Hester and P. Scowen (Arizona State University); WFC3 image: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

At the bottom left of this vertical image are the thickest regions of brown and rusty red gas and dust. There are many layers of semi-transparent gas and dust overlaying one another. A peak rises about a third of the way from the bottom, and becomes far darker brown with two bright red areas toward the tip. The light brown dust becomes more diaphanous about halfway up the screen. There’s a slight gap in the dust, which allows the blue background to come into view clearly. About 60% of the background in this image is set in shades of blue and littered with tiny yellow and blue stars. The brown pillars continue, taking the shape of a shoulder at the base, with three prominent columns rising out toward the upper right. The top left pillar is the largest and widest. The peaks of the second and third pillars are set off in darker shades of brown and have red outlines. For more details, download the Text Description.

The Pillars of Creation are set off in a kaleidoscope of color in NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s near-infrared-light view. The pillars look like arches and spires rising out of a desert landscape, but are filled with semi-transparent gas and dust, and ever changing. This is a region where young stars are forming – or have barely burst from their dusty cocoons as they continue to form. Newly formed stars are the scene-stealers in this Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) image. These are the bright red orbs that sometimes appear with eight diffraction spikes. When knots with sufficient mass form within the pillars, they begin to collapse under their own gravity, slowly heat up, and eventually begin shining brightly. Along the edges of the pillars are wavy lines that look like lava. These are ejections from stars that are still forming. Young stars periodically shoot out supersonic jets that can interact within clouds of material, like these thick pillars of gas and dust. This sometimes also results in bow shocks, which can form wavy patterns like a boat does as it moves through water. These young stars are estimated to be only a few hundred thousand years old, and will continue to form for millions of years. Although it may appear that near-infrared light has allowed Webb to “pierce through” the background to reveal great cosmic distances beyond the pillars, the interstellar medium stands in the way, like a drawn curtain. This is also the reason why there are almost no distant galaxies in this view. This translucent layer of gas blocks our view of the deeper universe. Plus, dust is lit up by the collective light from the packed “party” of stars that have burst free from the pillars. It’s like standing in a well-lit room looking out a window – the interior light reflects on the pane, obscuring the scene outside and, in turn, illuminating the activity at the party inside. Webb’s new view of the Pillars of Creation will help researchers revamp models of star formation. By identifying far more precise star populations, along with the quantities of gas and dust in the region, they will begin to build a clearer understanding of how stars form and burst out of these clouds over millions of years. The Pillars of Creation is a small region within the vast Eagle Nebula, which lies 6,500 light-years away.

Science NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI Image Processing Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Anton M. Koekemoer (STScI), Alyssa Pagan (STScI)

Hubble Revisits the Famous 'Pillars of Creation' to Celebrate 25th Anniversary

WFPC2 image: NASA, ESA, STScI, and J. Hester and P. Scowen (Arizona State University); WFC3 image: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

Science NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI Image Processing Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Anton M. Koekemoer (STScI), Alyssa Pagan (STScI)

visible light

Near Infrared

Side by Side Draggable Comparison

Hubble's Visible and Near-Infrared Views of the Pillars of Creation

Comparison of Hubble's visible and Webb's near infrared (NIRCam) views of the Pillars of Creation. In image on the left - Hubble's visible light view can't see inside and around the pillars of dust because the visible light emitted by those stars is being obscured by the dust. In the image on the right - Webb's NIRCam infrared view reveals more structure within the dust clouds and hidden stars have now become apparent.

Webb is optimized for infrared observation with four instruments, each with many instrument modes and filters enabling Webb to observe astronomical objects with far more nuanced infrared techniques and in far more detail than previous missions. Below we compare three of Webb's infrared views of the Pillars of Creation.

Three Webb images shown side by side in three even areas. From left to right, a near-infrared image, a mid-infrared image, and a composite of the two. All three show several similar features, including many layers and pillars of semi-opaque gas and dust that overlay one another. The first pillar starts at the bottom left and extends to the top right. Below the top pillar are two slightly smaller pillars. In near-infrared, the pillars are light brown and dark brown, the background is washed in shades of bright blue, and there are thousands of stars. In mid-infrared, the pillars are light blue and dark gray-blue. The background is in shades of red, and there are only several dozen tiny bright white and blue stars overall. In the composite, the pillars appear light gray and dark gray. The background is blue at bottom left, orange at top center, and hazy pink outside the pillars. Thousands of stars are spread throughout the scene. Please reference the extended text description for more details.

Webb captured three views of the iconic Pillars of Creation, a star-forming region in the Eagle Nebula. From left to right, the scene is shown in near-infrared (NIRCam instrument), mid-infrared (MIRI instrument), and a combination of near- and mid-infrared light. Learn what each type of light reveals about the star-forming region.

Science NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI Image Processing Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Alyssa Pagan (STScI), Anton M. Koekemoer (STScI)

Webb's Spectroscopic Capabilities

Webb's imaging and spectroscopy capabilities are allowing us to study stars as they are forming in their dusty cocoons. Additionally, it is able to image disks of heated material around these young stars, which can indicate the beginnings of planetary systems, and study organic molecules that are important for life to develop.

When it comes to infrared spectroscopy, you can’t beat the James Webb Space Telescope. With a giant mirror designed to collect infrared light from extremely dim objects, Webb has the ability to reveal infrared spectra of almost any type of object or material in space with unprecedented detail.

Webb’s primary mirror intercepts infrared light as it travels through space and reflects it onto a smaller secondary mirror. The secondary mirror then focuses the light into one or more of the four scientific instruments, each of which has spectrographs that disperse the light into its component colors to reveal infrared spectra.

Graph labeled “Very low-mass star, ISO-ChaI 147, Hydrocarbons in protoplanetary disk, MIRI medium resolution spectroscopy.” The x-axis is labeled “Wavelength of Light, microns” and extends from 6 to 17 microns with tick marks every 2 microns. The y-axis is labeled “Brightness” and has an up arrow labeled “brighter” and a down arrow labeled “dimmer.” A jagged dark-gray line with various peaks extends horizontally. Five peaks are highlighted with colored vertical bands, and the data line within the bands is a brighter gray. They are: methane (CH4) from about 7 to 8.5 microns, ethane (C2H6) from 11.5 to 12.6 microns, cyanoacetylene (HC3N) at about 15.2 microns, propyne (C3H4) at about 15.8 microns, and methyl radical (CH3) from 16.3 to 16.8 microns.

The spectrum of the star ISO-ChaI 147 revealed by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows the richest hydrocarbon chemistry seen to date in a protoplanetary disk, consisting of 13 carbon-bearing molecules. This includes the first extrasolar detection of ethane (C2H6). The team also successfully detected ethylene (C2H4), propyne (C3H4), and the methyl radical CH3, for the first time in a protoplanetary disk.

NASA, ESA, CSA, Ralf Crawford (STScI)

Webb has a number of spectroscopy “modes” to choose from (think modes on a digital camera), depending on what you are interested in. Some involve capturing the overall spectrum of a wide field of view—a field of stars or part of a nearby galaxy, for example. Others focus in on the spectrum of a single object, like a star, exoplanet, or distant galaxy. Two of the instruments have camera-spectrograph combos called integral field units that can capture an image along with a spectrum of each pixel in the image. And to top it off, Webb also has a nifty tool called a microshutter array—a grid of 248,000 tiny doors that can open and shut on command—making it possible to capture detailed spectra from more than 100 individual objects or locations at the same time.

In fact, while Webb is also capturing spectacular infrared images of space, its real power is in spectroscopy, and the vast majority of Webb’s investigations include spectroscopy. Astronomers are using spectra captured by Webb to study:

Surfaces and atmospheres of planet, moons, comets, asteroids, and Kuiper Belt objects in our Solar System
Fully-formed exoplanets, planets in the process of forming, and proto-planetary debris disks orbiting distant stars in the Milky Way
Mature stars of different size, mass, age, color, temperature, evolutionary stage, and formation environment; and newly forming stars cocooned in dense dark clouds of gas and dust
Cold molecular clouds that collapse to form stars; gas and dust ejected from dying stars; and molecules between stars
Galaxies at different stages of evolution, including the first galaxies in their earliest stages of development

Webb also captures spectra that are used to study objects and materials that are invisible in infrared—such as black holes, dark matter, and infrared dark clouds—based on their influence on materials that do give off infrared light.

Latest Images : Star Lifecycle Theme

The image below is a SLIDESHOW of all NASA published imagery in the Star Lifecycle theme.
USAGE: Hover over the image to see the image title and controls. Click the arrows to move through the slide show, click the image to go to a detail page with more info and the ability to download the image at various resolutions.

NASA's Webb Scratches Beyond Surface of Cat’s Paw for 3rd Anniversary

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What’s Up: July 2026 Skywatching Tips from NASA

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Highlights

NASA’s Webb Discovers Hidden Planet in Famous Star System

Utah Helicopter Flights Test NASA’s DAVINCI Mission to Venus

NASA’s Roman Telescope Will Spot Distant Black Holes That Shred Stars

Highlights

NASA Seeks Industry Input on Second Phase of Commercial Space Stations

NASA Seeks Volunteers for New Yearlong Simulated Moon, Mars Mission

Expedition 73 Crew Reflects on Science, Teamwork, and Life in Orbit

Highlights

Ontario Wildfire Smoke Moves East

Heat Dome Broils the Western U.S.

Fans of the Arctic

Highlights

NASA Study of Pristine Meteorite Adds to Story of Ancient Asteroids

NASA’s Perseverance Rover Reads Record of Ancient Mars Impacts

SkyFall

Highlights

NASA’s Webb Discovers Hidden Planet in Famous Star System

NASA’s Roman Telescope Will Spot Distant Black Holes That Shred Stars

NASA’s Hubble Discovers First of Star Cluster’s Missing Black Holes

Highlights

NASA Study of Pristine Meteorite Adds to Story of Ancient Asteroids

Viking Project

Astrobiology in Missions

Highlights

NASA Uses Subscale Aircraft to Accelerate Flight Innovation

SkyFall

NASA Study Points to Smoother Air Taxi Rides

Highlights

Ontario Wildfire Smoke Moves East

Space Storm Solar Sail Sentinel (S5)

Super Typhoon Bavi

Highlights

Space Out This Summer with Variety of NASA STEM Activities

Highlights

NASA Study Points to Smoother Air Taxi Rides

NASA Seeks Volunteers for New Yearlong Simulated Moon, Mars Mission

How NASA’s Artemis III Lander Test Will Pave Way for Moon Landings

Highlights

La NASA anuncia la cobertura de la misión lunar Artemis II

Agenda diaria de la misión a la Luna de Artemis II de la NASA

La NASA refuerza Artemis: añade una misión y perfecciona su arquitectura general

Webb Science Theme

Star Lifecycle

Key Questions

Key Findings / Discoveries : Star Lifecycle

Locating a Former Star That Exploded as a Supernova

New views of the Helix planetary nebula, formed by a dying Sun-like star

Identifying the Earliest Supernova to Date

Defining structure in the chaos

Better understanding massive star formation

Starbirth in the Pismis 24 star cluster

Unprecedented views of the detail and structure of ejections of gas and dust from actively forming stars

Finding the lower mass limits of so-called “failed stars” found in star-forming regions

The effects of strong magnetic fields on star-formation in the central part of our galaxy

Introduction: Star Lifecycle

The Star Lifecycle in Four Images:

Related Information

In Depth: What is Webb Studying and How?

Star Lifecycle

Planetary System Formation

Brown Dwarfs

Space Storm Solar Sail Sentinel (S5)