UC Berkeley astrophysicist Alex Filippenko presents deep space images from the James Webb Space Telescope, explaining new discoveries about early galaxy formation.
“Over the whole sky, we can see about a trillion galaxies, a million, million galaxies, and some of them we see forming just a few hundred million years after the explosive birth of the universe, the so-called Big Bang, and one of the interesting aspects of this image is that galaxies started forming and evolving earlier than expected”
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More from Alex Filippenko
AssertionPartly supported
Filippenko: NSF graduate fellowships and NASA funding were cut in half
“The number of National Science Foundation graduate fellowships, for example, was cut in half this year. NASA funding has been cut in half”
Alex FilippenkoSep 30, 2025▶ 35:42Science Corner Special! David Friedberg, Cleo Abram, Alex Filippenko, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton
AssertionNot checkable as stated
Filippenko: JWST cost US taxpayers roughly six dollars per year
“Over 10 years, the ten billion dollar cost of the web Was one six dollar hamburger per U.S. Taxpayer per year.”
Alex FilippenkoSep 30, 2025▶ 22:28Science Corner Special! David Friedberg, Cleo Abram, Alex Filippenko, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton
AssertionSupported
Filippenko: JWST has six times the light-collecting area of Hubble
“Webb has six times the collecting area of Hubble, so it's a more powerful telescope.”
Alex FilippenkoSep 30, 2025▶ 12:02Science Corner Special! David Friedberg, Cleo Abram, Alex Filippenko, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton
AssertionNot checkable as stated
Filippenko: Nearly every star in the sky has orbiting planets
“It turns out that nearly every star you see in the sky has a collection of planets around it.”
Alex FilippenkoSep 30, 2025▶ 16:48Science Corner Special! David Friedberg, Cleo Abram, Alex Filippenko, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton
AssertionSupported
Filippenko: Methane and oxygen have not been found on any exoplanet
“We've not seen methane and oxygen in any other planetary atmosphere yet”
Alex FilippenkoSep 30, 2025▶ 24:56Science Corner Special! David Friedberg, Cleo Abram, Alex Filippenko, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton
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