The nebula is a hotbed for some of the hottest and most massive stars known to astronomers, and in the centre, sparkling blue with massive young stars, is star cluster R136, its most active region.

“R136 sits in the middle of the larger cluster called NGC2070,” says Professor Mark McCaughrean, senior advisor for science and exploration at the European Space Agency (ESA).

“R136 is a giant cluster of young stars, far exceeding anything in our own Milky Way galaxy, with almost half a million solar masses. It’s often suggested that it may be a proto-globular cluster, and its huge cumulative luminosity is what lights up the Tarantula Nebula, of which the new JWST image only shows a small fraction,” McCaughrean explains.

Blistering radiation has blown away the dusty cocoons that once surrounded these protostars. Left behind is only the densest material, sculpted into pillars and ridges able to resist erosion from these torrential stellar winds.

Within these pillars are more newly-forming protostars. They too, will eventually emerge from their own cosmic cocoons and take their turn in shaping the nebula.

“The JWST image of the Tarantula Nebula was made using mosaics made through four separate infrared filters, F090W, F200W, F335M, and F444W, at 0.9, 2.0, 3.35, and 4.44 microns, respectively,” McCaughrean says.

“The first, second, and fourth filters are all broad-band, capturing lots of starlight and nebular emissions. The third, the F335M filter, isolates an important emission line of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, a strong tracer of dust.”