大象传媒

Is that a penguin in space?

One on side is the James Webb image of what looks like a golden penguin made from stars and dust and on the other side is an actual penguinImage source, NASA/Getty
Image caption,

You can see how it got its nickname ' The Penguin and the Egg'

Okay, maybe there aren't ACTUAL penguins in space but this picture from the James Webb Space Telescope certainly looks a bit like one!

Nasa has released the image to celebrate two years since the high tech telescope's first images.

It has been nicknamed 'The Penguin and the Egg' and shows pair of galaxies - called Arp 142 - that are intertwined with each other.

You can check out some more of the amazing photographs the James Webb Telescope has captured here.

Image source, NASA
Image caption,

The Penguin and the Egg are 326 million light-years away from Earth

The penguin shape is formed by two galaxies that intertwine - an oval-shaped elliptical galaxy and a spiral galaxy.

They are around 100,000 light-years apart from each other and nearly the same mass which means they have a gravitational pull that is roughly equal, and that is why they haven't merged together.

Scientists say they first passed each other between 25 and 75 million years ago, forming new stars in the process which you can see in the penguin's beak and tail. Meanwhile the wispy orange bits are made up of dust.

A quick history of the Hubble Space Telescope

Image source, Nasa

The James Webb Telescope launched on Christmas Day in December 2021, with its first images released in July 2022.

It's named after one of the main scientists behind the Apollo Moon landings and is the successor and upgrade to the famous Hubble space telescope.

It took 30 years to put together and is made up of 18 mirrored segments which are specially designed to capture infrared light from the first galaxies that formed in the early universe.

One of the many aims of the telescope is to train it to detect atmospheres on distant planets to see if those worlds could have life.