  The new capabilities that JWST offers in the near- and mid-infrared (IR) are
used to investigate in unprecedented detail the nature of optical/near-IR
faint, mid-IR bright sources, HST-dark galaxies among them. We gather JWST data
from the CEERS survey in the EGS, jointly with HST data, and analyze spatially
resolved optical-to-mid-IR spectral energy distributions (SEDs) to estimate
both photometric redshifts in 2 dimensions and stellar populations properties
in a pixel-by-pixel basis. We select 138 galaxies with F150W-F356W>1.5 mag,
F356W<27.5 mag. The nature of these sources is threefold: (1) 71% are dusty
star-forming galaxies at 2<z<6 with masses 9<log M/M_sun<11 and a variety of
specific SFRs (<1 to >100 Gyr^-1); (2) 18% are quiescent/dormant (i.e., subject
to reignition and rejuvenation) galaxies at 3<z<5, masses log M/M_sun~10 and
post-starburst stellar mass-weighted ages (0.5-1 Gyr); and (3) 11% are strong
young starbursts with indications of high-EW emission lines (typically,
[OIII]+Hbeta) at 6<z<7 and log M/M_sun~9.5. The sample is dominated by
disk-like galaxies with a remarkable compactness for XELG-z6 (effective radii
smaller than 0.4 kpc). Large attenuations in SFGs, 2<A(V)<5 mag, are found
within 1.5 times the effective radius, approximately 2 kpc, while QGs present
A(V)~0.2 mag. Our SED-fitting technique reproduces the expected dust emission
luminosities of IR-bright and sub-millimeter galaxies. This study implies high
levels of star formation activity between z~20 and z~10, where virtually 100%
of our galaxies had already formed 10^8 M_sun of their stellar content, 60% of
them had assembled 10^9 M_sun, and 10% up to 10^10 M_sun (in situ or ex situ).
(abridged)
