NASA's James Webb revealed tens of thousands of hidden stars inside the Tarantula Nebula

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captured the Tarantula Nebula, about 161,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud, revealing tens of thousands of never-before-seen young stars previously hidden by cosmic dust. Webb's instruments found a central cavity carved by radiation from massive young stars, dense pillars still containing forming protostars, and one very young star just beginning to emerge from its dusty cocoon — overturning earlier assumptions about its age. Astronomers noted the nebula's chemical makeup closely resembles star-forming regions from the universe's "cosmic noon," when star formation peaked billions of years ago, making it the closest detailed example of that ancient process still visible today. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb ERO Production Team