NASA has released a stunning new map of the cosmos, one that the agency says could help scientists solve some of the universe’s longstanding mysteries.
Taken using the agency’s SPHEREx space telescope, the first all-sky map simulates the instrument’s three-dimensional view of the sky, including the burnt red cosmic dust, electric blue hydrogen gas and white, blue and green stars.
The panoramic view captures these and dozens of other colors using the telescope’s ability to see infrared wavelengths of light, which are invisible to the human eye.
The colors allow astronomers to measure the distance from the telescope to hundreds of millions of galaxies, with the map’s three-dimensional view measuring how the galaxies captured are distributed across the universe. Redder galaxies are farther away and closer ones appear blue, as light stretches or retracts, in a phenomenon known as “redshift.”
Scientists will use this data, collected since the telescope’s launch into low-Earth orbit in March, to study how galaxies have changed over the universe’s nearly 14 billion-year history and potentially learn more about how key ingredients for life were made in our Milky Way galaxy.
“While not visible to the human eye, these 102 infrared wavelengths of light are prevalent in the cosmos, and observing the entire sky this way enables scientists to answer big questions,” NASA explained in a release, “including how a dramatic event that occurred in the first billionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second after the big bang influenced the three-dimensional distribution of hundreds of millions of galaxies in our universe.”
While the James Webb Space Telescope can see in infrared light, as well, its scope is thousands of times smaller.
To date, no mission has mapped the entire sky in as many colors as SPHEREx.
The SPHEREx telescope – also known as the “Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer” – is currently orbiting roughly 400 miles above Earth.
It circles Earth approximately 14.5 times a day, taking about 3,600 images along one circular strip of the sky, and constantly shifting to capture the entire sky in 360 degrees.
It will complete three more all-sky scans during its two-year mission, collecting data on more than 450 million galaxies and more than 100 million stars in the Milky Way.
“SPHEREx is a mid-sized astrophysics mission delivering big science,” NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Director Dave Gallagher said. “It’s a phenomenal example of how we turn bold ideas into reality, and in doing so, unlock enormous potential for discovery.”