Webb revealed how “hot” crystals end up in “icy” comets: protostar EC 53 provides the first solid evidence
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has delivered the first unambiguous evidence linking two seemingly incompatible worlds: crystalline silicates that form at high temperatures and comets that form and reside in the cold outer regions of planetary systems. In a NASA Science release dated January 21, 2026, it was highlighted that Webb, by observing a very young, Sun-like star in formation, clearly showed where the crystals are actually made and that, in the same system, it detected a powerful mechanism that can transport them outward to the outer, icy zones. This is the first time observations have connected both the source of the crystals and the “conveyor belt” that can deliver them to regions where comets form over time. The object in question is the protostar EC 53, which has been monitored from the ground and from space for decades, and has now become a kind of natural laboratory for solving a problem that has repeatedly surfaced in studies of our Solar System. This matters to scientists because comets carry preserved traces of the earliest stages of planet formation, so every detail about their mineralogy also changes the picture of what the time looked like when the Sun and planets were forming.
The observations and interpretation were published in a paper in the journal
Nature, and are based on Webb data obtained with the instrument MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument), which operates in the mid-infrared and is particularly well suited to “mineral detection” in dust. According to NASA’s description, MIRI collected two sets of highly detailed spectra and enabled researchers to recognize which types of silicates are found near the star and to determine where they are located in the disk before and during the enhanced activity phase. According to the same release, the paper’s lead author Jeong-Eun Lee of Seoul National University in South Korea emphasizes that layered outflows can lift newly formed crystalline silicates and carry them toward the edge of the disk, almost as if they were on a “cosmic highway.” Co-author Joel Green of the Space Telescope Science Institute notes that Webb enables not only the identification of particles but also the mapping of their distribution and movement through the system, while astronomer Doug Johnstone of the National Research Council of Canada reminds that these are minerals also known on Earth, including forsterite and enstatite, which are among common constituents of silicate rocks. In the manuscript that NASA publishes as accompanying scientific documentation, it is stated that the observations were timed for a calmer phase on October 5, 2023, and for an outburst phase on May 10, 2024, which enables a direct “before and during” comparison. In practice, this means Webb does not provide only a “photograph” of the system, but also records how the mineral signatures change when the star suddenly brightens and begins to accrete material more intensely. Such temporal coordination was key to the conclusion that the crystals are not merely randomly present in the disk, but are indeed created in the hottest zone at the moment of the outburst and then carried toward the edge.
Why crystalline silicates in comets are a puzzle at all
Comets are often described as “dirty snowballs” because they are made of a mixture of ice, dust, and organic compounds, and in our Solar System a large share of them comes from two distant reservoirs. In its Kuiper Belt facts, NASA describes the belt as a large, “donut-shaped” region of icy bodies far beyond Neptune’s orbit, while for the Oort Cloud it states that it is an extremely distant spherical zone that surrounds the Solar System at distances of approximately 5,000 to 100,000 astronomical units. In such cold regions, the Sun’s heat is weak, so dust there is expected to remain mostly in an amorphous, “unprocessed” state. However, decades of infrared observations of comets have shown the presence of crystalline silicates, minerals whose formation typically requires intense heating. This created a paradox: how do high-temperature minerals end up in bodies that form and reside in very cold parts of the system. Scientists have considered various explanations for decades, from mixing of material within the disk to shock events, but a clear observational proof was missing that, in a single system, would simultaneously show both the place where the crystals form and the physical “path” by which they are moved outward. It is precisely at this point that Webb’s observation of EC 53 brought a turning point, because it links those two elements into a single, testable picture.
EC 53 and a “reliable” outburst cycle: an ideal target for Webb
The protostar EC 53 is located in the Serpens Nebula, a region that, according to NASA data, is about 1,300 light-years away and rich in young stars in formation. It is especially valuable to observers because it behaves unusually predictably: NASA notes that roughly every 18 months it enters a phase of a strong outburst that lasts about 100 days. During that period, the star accretes material from the disk more quickly, meaning that in a short time it “pulls” a larger amount of gas and dust toward itself, and releases part of the energy and material through jets and winds. Such regularity is rare among young stars because outbursts are often chaotic or can last for decades, making them difficult to plan and observe in real time. That is exactly why EC 53 served as a “metronome”: the team could predict when the calmer phase would occur and when the more active one would occur, and thus point Webb at the right moment. This is especially important in research on planet formation, because short episodes of enhanced accretion can have a disproportionately large impact on the temperature and chemistry of the inner disk, and thus on the composition of material that later ends up in planets and comets.
What Webb actually saw: a crystal “factory” and spectral signatures
According to NASA’s release, Webb for the first time clearly showed that crystalline silicates form in the hottest, inner part of the disk around a very young protostar, in a zone that, by analogy with our system, can be compared with the region roughly between the Sun and Earth. In that part of the disk, temperatures can rise enough for amorphous silicate grains to transition into a crystalline structure, and that appears in the spectrum as specific infrared features that MIRI can resolve. The authors of the paper, as reported by NASA, emphasize that Webb did not merely “identify” the mineral species, but was also able to spatially map where they are located before and during the outburst, which is crucial for understanding the cause. In this context, forsterite and enstatite stand out in particular, crystalline silicates that are geologically known on Earth and, in an astrophysical sense, are important “building blocks” of dust. In addition, NASA emphasizes that these are extremely tiny particles, each far smaller than a grain of sand, which explains why their “signature” is best read precisely through infrared spectroscopy. Unlike today’s fully formed, largely “dust-cleared” Solar System, here we are looking at a system in a phase when the disk is still dense, dynamic, and rich in material, so the processes of mineral formation and redistribution can be tracked more directly.
- Crystalline silicates, according to Webb’s data, form in the hottest inner part of the disk around EC 53, in episodes of enhanced accretion.
- The system contains structured winds and jets that can lift fine dust from inner layers and carry it outward to the outer zones of the disk.
- The observations were carried out in two phases (calm and active), enabling a comparison of the chemistry and mineralogy “before and during the outburst.”
- The minerals forsterite and enstatite were identified, and their presence and distribution are linked to the hottest part of the disk and changes across activity phases.
A “cosmic highway” toward the disk’s edge: how winds solve the comet paradox
Crystallization in the inner disk alone is not enough to explain cometary material; the crucial question is how the crystals reach the cold regions where comets can form. NASA states that the MIRI data show two complementary forms of ejection: narrow, fast jets of hot gas along the protostar’s poles and broader, slower outflows that originate from the innermost and hottest area of the disk. That combination suggests a mechanism in which particles do not move only “radially” within the plane of the disk, but can be lifted above the disk and then redirected toward the outer regions. The release uses the metaphor of a “cosmic highway”: layered outflows can lift newly formed crystals and transport them over large distances, to parts of the disk that are cold enough for comets and other icy bodies to form there. It is important that these are extremely tiny particles, smaller than a grain of sand, which readily couple to gas flows and can be carried by winds more efficiently than larger chunks. Such “vertical-radial” transport offers a natural explanation for why comets can contain material that was once heated near a young star but was later stored in the system’s cold regions. In practical terms, Webb’s data suggest that the crystals’ path is two-phase: first formation in a warm zone, then rapid “export” to cold peripheral regions where ice and dust can join into larger bodies. NASA adds that additional visual support for the interpretation was provided by an image from Webb’s NIRCam instrument: near EC 53, scattered light and one set of winds appear as a bright, semicircular arc tilted to the right, while in the opposite direction the material flows occur “behind” the star, but that part appears darker in the near-infrared. The jets are, according to the description, so spatially narrow that in that configuration it is not possible to clearly separate them.
Implications for planet formation: comets as witnesses of material mixing
The result for EC 53 strongly suggests that early planetary systems are not chemically neatly “arranged” by distance from the star, but that material travels and mixes more than is often intuitively imagined. If crystalline silicates form close to the star and then winds and outflows transport them outward, then comets can become repositories of mixed-origin material: some formed in the “hot” inner zone, and some in the cold periphery. That explains why a comet, even though we observe it as an icy body, can carry mineral traces that require high temperatures. In its release NASA also provides a broader temporal context: EC 53 is still shrouded in dust and could remain in such a state for about 100,000 years, while over millions of years the disk is expected to undergo many collisions and gradual “building” of larger bodies, from pebbles to planetesimals and finally planets. In such disk evolution, the mineral composition of dust is not just a detail, but can affect thermal properties, grain dynamics, and chemical conditions in zones where rocky planets and icy bodies form. In other words, Webb’s observation of EC 53 answers not only the question “where do crystals in comets come from,” but also how material in forming systems is recycled and redistributed. For understanding the early Solar System, this is an important message: comets may not be a “pure” picture of only the cold periphery, but an archive of processes that also occurred closer to the Sun and were then carried outward to the edge.
Why MIRI is key and what to expect next
The MIRI instrument, according to NASA’s description, covers the mid-infrared range from approximately 4.9 to 28.8 micrometers and enables both imaging and spectroscopy, which is crucial for reading mineral “signatures” in dust and gas. In its description, ESA emphasizes that MIRI must be significantly colder than the other instruments on Webb’s observatory to operate in that range, which is why such measurements are technologically demanding and sensitive to calibration quality. Combined with the predictable outburst behavior of EC 53, Webb had a rare opportunity to “catch” the system in two states and observe changes rather than only a static picture. The scientific point of such results is not limited to one star: the question that naturally arises is how universal such a mechanism is in young systems and how efficiently it can seed outer zones with crystals under different conditions of disk mass, magnetic field, and accretion rate. That is why future observations of other protostars are important, especially those with less regular outbursts, to test whether EC 53 is representative or an exception that nevertheless shows what is possible in principle. Webb’s result, however, already changes the tone of the debate: instead of a general “maybe they somehow get transported,” there is now a concrete example in which we can see where they form and which route they can take. For NASA’s international program in cooperation with ESA and CSA, such findings confirm one of Webb’s key advantages: the ability to extract, from the “chemistry of dust,” a story about the dynamics and formation history of planetary systems.
Sources:- NASA Science – official release on observations of protostar EC 53 and the interpretation of the formation/transport of crystalline silicates (release January 21, 2026.) (link)- NASA Science (asset) – illustration “Silicate Crystallization and Movement Near Protostar EC 53” with publication date and process description (link)- NASA (hosted PDF) – scientific manuscript “EPISODE of Accretion Burst Crystallizes Silicates in a Planet Forming Disk” with methodology and dates of MIRI observations (October 5, 2023 and May 10, 2024) (link)- NASA Science – Kuiper Belt facts as a distant zone of icy bodies in the Solar System (link)- NASA Science – Oort Cloud facts as a very distant comet reservoir (link)- NASA Science – description of the MIRI instrument on the James Webb telescope (wavelengths and operating modes) (link)- ESA Webb – description of the MIRI instrument and cooling technical requirements in the mid-infrared (link)
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