On Christmas Day, NASA will give an astronomer one of the greatest gifts it can give, by launching the most powerful space telescope ever created. The space observatory is called the James Webb Space Telescope and is meant to be the successor to NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. It promises to change the way we study the universe.
The biggest mirror of any space-bound telescope ever launched is used to collect light from distant stars. The telescope will be able to peer back in time and see some of the earliest objects that formed after the Big bang. It will uncover the mysteries of black holes, alien worlds, stellar explosions, dark matter, and more.
It will reveal the mysteries of black holes, alien worlds, stellar explosions, and more.
NASA has been working for nearly three decades to get this telescope to the launchpad. The telescope is going to be launched on top of a European Ariane 5 rocket in South America on December 25th. There is still a long way to go before the telescope is in space. Because it is so large, it must fly up. It will take up to two weeks to unfurl in space. The reverse origami needs to go exactly right for the telescope to function.
The JWST will live out its life in a cold spot 1 million miles from Earth, collecting as much light as it can. There are many opportunities for things to go wrong during the launch and mission. If everything goes well, the world's astronomer will have a powerful tool at their disposal for the next 10 years.
One of NASA's most important launches of the decade was discussed.
The impressive features
The first thing to know is that it is massive. The telescope has a mirror that is more than 6 meters wide. Hubble's mirror is just under 8 feet, or 2.4 meters, across, and it has been responsible for images of some of the most famous objects in the Universe. Thanks to its larger mirror, the JWST will be able to spot very faint objects in the sky.
The deputy project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center tells The Verge that a telescope mirror is like a light bucket. The bigger the mirror, the more stuff you collect. The stuff is from the distant Universe.
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The primary mirror is being tested.
The image is of Northrop Grumman.
The engineers had to build the mirror in pieces. It is made out of 18 hexagonal segments of the lightweight element beryllium, each one roughly the size of a coffee table. The segments have to align almost perfectly, so that they are aligned within a fraction of a wavelength of light, which is about a thousandth of a human hair.
Lee Feinberg, the optical telescope element manager for the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, tells The Verge that each mirror has to match the other mirrors to a small tolerance so that when they are aligned, they act as though they were a single mirror.
They act as if they were a single mirror.
The mirror is covered in a layer of gold that is 200 times thinner than the average human hair. The gold allows the JWST to see the light associated with some of the most distant stars in the universe. The farthest objects away from Earth are moving faster than objects that are closer to us. The light gets stretched and shifted away from the visible part of the spectrum and toward theIR when they sprint away. With its gold mirrors, the JWST should be able to see the light from the stars.
The telescope can see into the past. It will take a long time for the light from objects 13.6 billion light-years away to reach the telescope. The objects were around 100 to 250 million years after the Big bang, so we think the Universe is roughly 13 billion years old.
It is incredibly difficult to observe in the IR. Everything with a temperature above absolute zero is associated with heat. The heat from Earth and its atmosphere would cause the observations to be disrupted. The telescope needs to be extra cold so that it doesn't produce too much heat and throw off its own observations. The telescope is being sent to a place 1 million miles from our world, where the pull of gravity and Centrifugal forces are just right for the telescope to remain in a stable position. At this point in time, the JWST will remain at the same distance and position.
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The heat from the Sun is still a problem. A sun shield is a thing that is known as extra cool. It is made up of five thin layers of Kapton, each the size of a tennis court stacked on top of each other. Most of the heat of the Sun is reflected by the outermost layer, which is at a sizzling 230 degrees. Each layer will be cooler and cooler so that the instruments stay nice and cold.
There was a troubled history.
The journey to the launchpad has been long and bumpy. Astronomers at the Space Telescope Science Institute recommended in 1996 that NASA build a new telescope with a mirror 4 meters wide, after years of discussion about what the next major space telescope should look like. NASA administrator Dan Goldin wanted mission designers to increase the size of the mission to more than 8 meters.
The decision made the building of the spacecraft more complex. Since no rocket was large enough to hold the final configuration of the JWST, it had to be folded up. The technologies needed to make the telescope a reality still need to be invented.
Thomas Zurbuchen, the associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA, told The Verge that it was way more expensive than they thought.
It is way more expensive than we thought.
The estimated cost to launch the telescope was between $1 billion and $3.5 billion. The launch date was pushed back and back, as the costs continued to grow. The project was canceled over the snowballing budget. Congress agreed to continue funding the project while placing a budgetary cap on the total life of the telescope. The new launch date was set for next year.
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Costs continued to increase. There were a lot of issues when engineers began testing the telescope to make sure it was ready for space. While the telescope was at the primary contractor, screws and washers seemingly came off the vehicle at one point, engineers found tears in the sun shield, and someone applied excessive voltage during a test, to name a few errors. The final cost for the program was almost $10 billion, which included both development and operations in space. The agency admitted that it wouldn't be launching that year.
There were new controversies over the telescope. Astronomers raised concerns about the telescope's name, which was given to a NASA administrator who oversaw the United States' ambitious plan to put people on the Moon. The astronomer called on NASA to change the telescope's name because of the fact that he was a high-ranking civil servant in the Truman administration during the Lavender Scare. NASA decided not to change the telescope's name after doing its own investigation and finding no evidence that the astronomer was involved. The investigation wasn't deep enough.
There are no small mistakes that have consequences. You have to be perfect.
The launch site for the controversial name was finally shipped in October. When it arrived in South America, the brand's troubles continued. The telescope was supposed to be launched on December 18th, but was delayed twice due to a broken band, a communication issue between the rocket and ground systems, and unexpected vibrations through the telescope. NASA claims that the issue should not be an issue for launch because of the resolution of the clamp issue.
No matter how small of an issue it might seem, Zurbuchen explains that every precaution has to be taken. Everything has to go right because the spacecraft has taken so long and cost so much. A $10 billion telescope is dead in space.
Zurbuchen says that the majority of small mistakes have small consequences. There are no small mistakes that have consequences. You have to be perfect.
Is it just the start?
On December 25th at 7:21AM, the launch of the JWST will take place. The Ariane 5 rocket has been Europe's premier rocket for the last two decades. Ariane 5 is a rocket that has a strong launch record and is considered a truly global mission by NASA.
The Ariane 5 rocket should take 26 minutes to leave the launch site. When the Ariane 5 is no longer in use, there will be more anxiety about rocketing to space. It is only the beginning, says Straughn.
Launching is only the beginning.
The term "29 days on the edge" was created by NASA and is when the takeoff of the JWST goes well. The telescope has a complicated unfurling process. Once freed from the rocket and on its way to its destination, the spaceship will slowly unfurl and blossom.
After launch, the first thing the JWST must do is deploy its solar panel to start gathering energy from the Sun. It will use its high-gain antenna to communicate with Earth. The reverse origami begins after that. The process of changing its shape and starting to deploy its delicate sun shield will last for days. The telescope will deploy its primary mirror if that goes well.
After about two weeks, the unfurling will be done, but it won't be at its final destination. Less than a month before launch, the telescope will fire its onboard thrusters to put it into its final position.
A lot of scientists, engineers, and astronomer won't be getting much rest until the whole thing is over. There are a lot of times where a failed pulley or sticky actuator could jeopardize the mission.
NASA will soon have some incredibly sharp eyes if everything goes well. When the telescope reaches its final position, it will have to be cooled down and engineers will need some time to test the instruments. As soon as this summer, the JWST could be taking its first breathtaking images. The wait will be worth it for the astronomer.
The telescope will be transformational for astrophysics, says the astronomer. One of the most exciting prospects about putting a big, bold telescope like this into space is that we will be able to learn things about the Universe that we have never heard of before. We learn things we didn't expect.
