NASA's Webb Space Telescope Observes Interstellar Comet
NASA/James Webb Space Telescope
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope observed interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS Aug. 6, with its Near-Infrared Spectrograph instrument. The research team has been analyzing insights from Webb's data, and a preprint is available online. Webb is one of NASA's space telescopes observing this comet, together providing more information about its size, physical properties, and chemical makeup. For example, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the recently launched SPHEREx mission have also observed the comet. While the comet poses no threat to Earth, NASA's space telescopes help support the agency's ongoing mission to find, track, and better understand solar system objects.
Alise Fisher
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-2546
Abbey Interrante
August 25, 2025CategoriesCometsJames Webb Space Telescope (JWST) More from Comet 3I/ATLASNext PostNASA's New SPHEREx Mission Observes Interstellar CometAugust 25, 2025