Picture perfect: Mission managers say the telescope's mirror segments have been aligned and have focused on single stars, a critical milestone, and the telescope is working flawlessly.
The James Webb Space Telescope has seen its first starlight, but its 18 mirror segments aren't yet perfectly aligned. As a result, the pictures it's sending back now aren't exactly cosmic eye candy.
An article suggests the natural light show starts when disturbances on the sun pull on Earth's magnetic field, creating cosmic waves that launch electrons into the atmosphere to form the aurora.