MPR News Chief Meteorologist Paul Huttner signs off

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

Ever wondered what the Sun looked like in its infancy? 

A new image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has captured what Earth's sun looked like when it was only a few tens of thousands of years old. 

The image of Herbig-Haro 211 (HH 211), released by NASA on Sept. 14, shows the outflow of a young star. "An infantile analogue of our Sun," NASA said in a 

Located about 1,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Perseus, HH21 has only about 8% of the Sun's mass. A Class 0 protostar, meaning the nascent star is less than 100,000 years old, "eventually will grow into a star like the Sun," 

The stunning, high-resolution image, with shades of blue and pink erupting from a dark center, shows the luminous region surrounding the newborn star, known as a Herbig-Haro object. As the new star ejects gas jets, these winds collide with neighboring gas and dust, producing the colorful outflow we see in the image. 

On X (previously Twitter), the image of HH211 inspired different interpretations from viewers. 

"like stretching when i wake up from a nap," 

 on a NASA post about the infrared image. 

"That kind of looks like the jet from a sci-fi particle cannon," 

, newborn stars are "invariably still embedded within the gas from the molecular cloud in which they formed," making them hard to document. However, Webb's sensitive infrared instruments make it a powerful tool to record these celestial bodies. 

Science

Homepage

Clare Marie Schneider

Author

A new image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope reveals what Earth's sun could have looked like in its infancy. 

NASA releases 'baby picture' of a star that will grow up to be much like our sun

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox