The simple recipe for making powerful astrophysical jets

You need just three ingredients to make these truly colossal 'double-sided lightsabers'

- DR KATIE MACK

On paper, the two most spectacular astronomical discoveries of the last few weeks couldn't possibly have less in common. One is an image captured by the James Webb Space Telescope of a newborn star in our Galaxy, the Milky Way, about 450 light-years away. It's an amazing picture of the birth of a solar system in a thin disc of dust in which planets are, as we speak, slowly starting to form.

The other is a combination of optical and radio data showing us a giant astrophysical system, larger than the Milky Way, and so far away that its light has taken more than 12 billion years to reach us. It gives us a glimpse of the incredible, intergalactic violence wrought by a supermassive black hole actively devouring its surroundings.

Still, a glance at the images shows a striking similarity, challenging any sense of scale. Both objects seem to be shooting light or material out into space in long, straight jets, stretching far out into the distance, like double-sided lightsabers.

Astrophysical jets are extremely common in the Universe and while the details vary, the physics that drive them are all based on the same basic features: gravity, rotation and magnetic fields.