O ne of the key challenges in astronomy is to measure accurate distances to celestial objects. Knowing distances is crucial since it allows us to measure physical properties such as size, mass and luminosity. Since we can’t go out and use a tape-measure, a range of different approaches have been developed. Many of these approaches rely on using “standard candles”. Standard candles are objects (for example stars or supernovae) for which we know their intrinsic ”true” brightness. Once we know this, then their observed brightness compared to their intrinsic brightness gives us a distance to the

Asteroids are the remnants of the planetary formation in the Solar System and so, their study helps us to understand the conditions during the early stages of the formation of our planetary system. Among asteroids, those classified as primitives present similar spectra to that of carbonaceous chondrites, i.e., they are rich in carbon and organic compounds and silicates altered by the presence of liquid water (phyllosilicates). Primitive asteroids are well characterized in various wavelength regions, showing their most diagnostic feature at 3μm. However, there is a lack of information in the

Type 2 quasars (QSO2s) are active galactic nuclei (AGN) seen through a significant amount of dust and gas that obscures the central supermassive black hole and the broad-line region. Here, we present new mid-infrared spectra of the central kiloparsec of five optically selected QSO2s at redshift z ∼ 0.1 obtained with the Medium Resolution Spectrometer module of the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) aboard the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). These QSO2s belong to the Quasar Feedback (QSOFEED) sample, and they have bolometric luminosities of log L bol  = 45.5 to 46.0 erg s −1 , global star