the space telescope James Webb investigation of one of the most dynamic star-forming areas in nearby galaxies, the so-called NGC 346, near our Milky Way, in which they have detected significant amounts of dust, which astronomers are unsure weren’t expecting, their webpage reported on Wednesday.

NCG 346 is located in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), a “dwarf galaxy” close to the Milky Way which contains lower concentrations of elements heavier than hydrogen or helium called metals.

Dust grains in space are mostly “metals”, scientists expected to find only small amounts of dust and that it would be difficult to detect them; but “new data” from the Webb telescope “reveals the opposite”.

Astronomers explored this region because “the conditions and amount of metals in the SMC resemble those observed in galaxies billions of years ago”, at a time in the history of the Universe known as the name of “cosmic noon”, when star formation was at its peak. peak.

Some 2 to 3 billion years after the Big Bang, he explains, galaxies were forming stars at breakneck speed, and “the fireworks of star formation that occurred then are still shaping the galaxies we see around us today”.

“Even though NGC 346 is now the only massive star-forming cluster in its galaxy, it provides us with an excellent opportunity to study the conditions that existed at ‘cosmic noon,'” said Margaret Meixner, astronomer and principal investigator of the team of scientists. .

Observing these forming “protostars” makes it easier for researchers to know if the process of star formation in the SMC is different from what we see in our own Milky Way.

As stars form, they “accumulate gas and dust that can appear as ribbons in Webb images” from the surrounding molecular cloud.

Astronomers have found gas around protostars in NGC 346, but Webb’s near-infrared observations mark the first time they’ve detected dust in those disks as well.

“With Webb, we can study lighter protostars as small as a tenth of our Sun” and find out if their formation process “is affected by low metal content,” said Olivia Jones of the UK Center for Astronomy Technology. .

For Guido De Marchi, of the European Space Agency (ESA), “we see the basic components not only of stars, but also potentially of planets”.

Webb is the largest and most powerful telescope ever launched into space, under an international collaboration agreement between ESA, NASA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).