The SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster
The firehose of James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) data has opened, and astronomers have begun to drink from it. Just days after the observatory’s first full-resolution image was released on 11 July, two groups of researchers have already analysed the data to recreate the structure of the galaxy cluster in the image.
The cluster, called SMACS 0723, is so massive that it warps space-time, bending and magnifying the light from the galaxies behind it in a process called gravitational lensing. JWST’s image of it …
