If you’re looking to freshen up your phone wallpaper, you’d be hard-pressed finding a better one than this.

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has captured a stunning image of the Pillars of Creation, the iconic arrangement of newly-forming stars made famous by a previous shot in 1995.

Back then, it was the Hubble Space Telescope taking the picture, and it revisited the scene 19 years later.

The latest image shows the pillars of gas and dust in their greatest detail yet, appearing like majestic rock formations from a planet out of science-fiction.

They are in fact found in the vast Eagle Nebula, which is 6,500 light years away from Earth.

NASA says the improved picture quality will help astronomers identify more stars, and count more precisely the quantities of gas and dust.

It was captured by the telescope’s Near-Infrared Camera, the space agency added.

Astronomers have mapped the remains of a dead star – with surprising results

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope takes image of dust ‘fingerprint’ created by two stars

NASA’s Dart mission successfully shifts asteroid’s orbit after deliberate crash

How to identify what’s in the picture

The most striking thing about the image are the newly-formed stars – those are the bright orbs you can see.

When knots with sufficient mass form within the pillars of gas and dust, they collapse under their own gravity, slowly heat up, and eventually form new stars.

Another eye-catching element of the picture are those wavy red lines, almost like lava.

NASA says those are ejections from stars that periodically shoot out supersonic jets that collide with the pillars.

These are among the youngest stars and are estimated to be only a few hundred thousand years old.

For more on science and technology, explore the future with Sky News at Big Ideas Live 2022.
Find out more and book tickets here

Related posts:

Scientists investigating whether rats could infect humans with COVID, official documents reveal Dixons Travel stores to close affecting 400 staff – after airside tax-free shopping axed ‘New public toilet’: Elon Musk life-size bronze statue mocked online Black holes detected eating neutron stars ‘like Pac-Man’ in world-first discovery ‘World’s first’ unisex condom invented by gynaecologist Increasing fears over risk of new Omicron variant impacting Christmas Dinosaur footprints discovered on South Wales beach date back 200 million years ‘Magic mushroom’ drug can be safely used to treat depression, British study finds Supercomputers could help prevent millions of deaths caused by antibiotic resistance Child influencers and their followers need better protection, say MPs ‘Milestone’ motor neurone disease treatment slows or even reverses progressive muscle weakness NASA-built spacecraft to deliberately crash into asteroid in test mission