Free Astronomy Magazine November-December 2023

35 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2023 Molecules excited by the turbulent conditions, including molecular hy- drogen, carbon monoxide, and sili- con monoxide, emit infrared light that Webb can collect to map out the structure of the outflows. The image showcases a series of bow shocks to the southeast (lower- left) and northwest (upper-right) as well as the narrow bipolar jet that powers them. Webb reveals this scene in unprecedented detail — roughly 5 to 10 times higher spatial resolution than any previous images of HH 211. The inner jet is seen to “wiggle” with mirror symmetry on either side of the central protostar. This is in agreement with observa- tions on smaller scales and suggests that the protostar may in fact be an unresolved binary star. Earlier observations of HH 211 with ground-based telescopes revealed giant bow shocks moving away from us (northwest) and moving to- wards us (southeast) and cavity-like structures in shocked hydrogen and carbon monoxide respectively, as well as a knotty and wiggling bipo- lar jet in silicon monoxide. Researchers have used Webb’s new observations to determine that the object’s outflow is relatively slow in comparison to more evolved proto- stars with similar types of outflows. The team measured the velocities of the innermost outflow structures to be roughly 48-60 miles per second (80 to 100 kilometers per second). However, the difference in velocity between these sections of the out- flow and the leading material they’re colliding with — the shock wave — is much smaller. The re- searchers concluded that outflows from the youngest stars, like that in the center of HH 211, are mostly made up of molecules, because the comparatively low shock wave ve- locities are not energetic enough to break the molecules apart into sim- pler atoms and ions. N ASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s high resolu- tion, near-infrared look at Her- big-Haro 211 reveals exquisite detail of the outflow of a young star, an infantile ana- logue of our Sun. Herbig-Haro objects are formed when stellar winds or jets of gas spewing from newborn stars form shock waves colliding with nearby gas and dust at high speeds. The image showcases a series of bow shocks to the southeast (lower-left) and northwest (upper-right) as well as the narrow bipolar jet that powers them in unprecedented detail. Molecules excited by the turbu- lent conditions, including mo- lecular hydrogen, carbon monoxide and silicon monox- ide, emit infrared light, col- lected by Webb, that map out the structure of the outflows. [ESA/Webb, NASA, CSA, Tom Ray (Dublin)] !