These two images are of the dusty debris disk around AU Mic, a red dwarf star located 32 light-years away in the southern constellation Microscopium. The team used Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) to study AU Mic. NIRCam’s coronagraph, which blocked the intense light of the central star, allowed the team to study the region very close to the star. The location of the star, which is masked out, is marked by a white, graphical representation at the center of each image. The region blocked by the coronagraph is shown by a dashed circle.
Webb provided images at 3.56 microns (top, blue) and 4.44 microns (bottom, red). The team found that the disk was brighter at the shorter or “bluer” wavelength, likely meaning that it contains a lot of fine dust that is more efficient at scattering shorter wavelengths of light.
The NIRCam images allowed the researchers to trace the disk, which spans a diameter of 60 astronomical units (5.6 billion miles), as close to the star as 5 astronomical units (460 million miles) – the equivalent of Jupiter’s orbit in our solar system. The images were more detailed and brighter than the team expected, and scientists were able to image the disk closer to the star than expected.
Credits
Science
NASA, ESA, CSA, Kellen Lawson (NASA-GSFC), Joshua E. Schlieder (NASA-GSFC)
Image Processing
Alyssa Pagan (STScI)
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | AU Mic, AU Micrscopii |
| Object Description | Debris Disk Around Nearby Star |
| R.A. Position | 20:45:9.49 |
| Dec. Position | -31:20:26.99 |
| Constellation | Microscopium |
| Distance | 32 light-years (9.79 parsecs) |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description | This image was created with Webb data from proposal: (J. Schlieder). |
| Instrument | NIRCam |
| Exposure Dates | 03 Oct 2022 |
| Filters | F356W, F444W |
| About The Image | |
| Color Info | The images are separate exposures acquired by the NIRCam instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope. The color results from assigning a cyan and red hue to monochromatic (grayscale) images. |
| Compass Image |  |
| About The Object | |
|---|---|
| Object Name | A name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object. |
| Object Description | The type of astronomical object. |
| R.A. Position | Right ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Dec. Position | Declination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position. |
| Constellation | One of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears. |
| Distance | The physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs. |
| Dimensions | The physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky. |
| About The Data | |
| Data Description |
|
| Instrument | The science instrument used to produce the data. |
| Exposure Dates | The date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time. |
| Filters | The camera filters that were used in the science observations. |
| About The Image | |
| Image Credit | The primary individuals and institutions responsible for the content. |
| Publication Date | The date and time the release content became public. |
| Color Info | A brief description of the methods used to convert telescope data into the color image being presented. |
| Orientation | The rotation of the image on the sky with respect to the north pole of the celestial sphere. |
