When you think of the results from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), images of swirling colorful clouds in nebulae, galaxies older than we’ve ever seen before, and infant stars being born probably come to mind. In its first year in space, results from NASA’s new powerhouse telescope have graced the cover of Scientific American, billboards in Times Square, and the computer screens of avid astronomy enthusiasts and casual readers alike. Viewers across the world, including even the president of the United States, have marveled at the cosmos as seen by this marvelous machine.
Yet, one of JWST’s most incredible results has slipped by mostly unnoticed and underappreciated. You may have missed it, or even dismissed the image as a drab dot—nothing near the splendor of sights like the Carina nebula.
I believe the most exciting JWST result yet is that dot—the telescope’s first image of an exoplanet, a planet around another star.
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