NASA's Webb Explores Largest Star-Forming Cloud in Milky Way

September 24, 2025 10:00AM (EDT)Release ID: 2025-141
A wide view of a region of space filled with stars and clumps of orange clouds.

Summary

The galactic center is packed with star-making material — why isn’t it producing more stars? Webb could reveal long-sought answers.

Sagittarius B2 is the Milky Way galaxy’s most massive and active star forming cloud, producing half of the stars created in the galactic center region despite having only 10 percent of the area’s star-making material. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope reveals stunning new views of the region, using both its near-infrared and mid-infrared instruments, to capture both its colorful stars and gaseous stellar nurseries in unprecedented detail. Astronomers think that analysis of Webb’s data will help unravel enduring mysteries of the star formation process, and why Sagittarius B2 is forming so many more stars than the rest of the galactic center.

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News releases highlighting the discoveries of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope are produced for NASA by the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, under NASA Contract NAS5-03127. News release content is developed by the News Team in STScI’s Office of Public Outreach.

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