JWST is the world’s marquee piece of astronomical equipment and the $10 billion observatory launched into space on Christmas Day 2021 after decades of development and years of delays.
Since it became operational earlier in 2022 it has amazed astronomers and the public alike with distant galaxies, spectacular images and now, its first exoplanet - a planet outside the Solar System.
The world it images is a gas giant called HIP 65426 b, which is about six to 12 times the mass of Jupiter and just 15 million years old; and, as a result of being a celestial infant, it is more than 900°C on the surface.
Life could not survive on this world, but scientists hope to use Webb in future to help scout out potential life-harbouring planets in the distant universe.
One year on the exoplanet takes 630 Earth years
Beth Biller, an astronomer at the University of Edinburgh who worked on JWST and studied the planet, told Quanta that this is “similar to a candle flame”.
The world was able to be seen by Webb because it is more than 100 times further from its star than Earth is to the Sun, allowing the telescope’s sensitive infrared sensors to block out the heat from the star and pick up the fainter signature of the planet.