The explosion of a star is a particularly impressive event in itself, but the debris left behind by such an explosion is even more impressive.

A new mid-infrared image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope provides a stunning example of the above.

It shows the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A (Cas A), created by a stellar explosion 340 years ago.

Cas A is the youngest known remnant from an explosion of a massive star in our galaxy and represents a unique opportunity to learn more about how such supernova stars form.

“Cas A represents our best chance to look at the debris field of an exploded star and perform a kind of stellar autopsy to understand what kind of star existed beforehand and how it exploded,” said Purdue University’s Danny Milisavljevic in West Lafayette. Indiana, principal investigator of the Webb program who captured these observations.

“Compared to previous infrared images, we see incredible detail that we didn’t have access to before,” added Tea Temim of Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey, co-investigator of the project.

Cassiopeia A is a prototypical supernova remnant that has been widely studied by a number of ground-based and space-based observatories, including NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory.

Multi-wavelength observations can be combined to provide scientists with a more comprehensive understanding of the remnant.