Cape Canaveral., The world’s largest and most powerful space telescope arrived yesterday at its observation post more than 1.6 million kilometers from Earth, a month after it took off on a mission to watch the dawn of the universe.
To the order, james webb it fired its rocket boosters for nearly five minutes to go into orbit around the Sun at its designated location, and NASA confirmed that the operation went as planned.
Mirrors at the $10 billion observatory still need to be meticulously aligned and infrared detectors cool enough before science observations can begin in June. However, flight controllers in Baltimore were elated after scoring another hit.
“We are one step closer to unlocking the mysteries of the universe. And I can’t wait to see the first new glimpses of the universe of webb this summer!” Bill Nelson, NASA administrator, said in a statement.
The telescope will allow astronomers to look further back in time than ever before, to when the first stars and galaxies formed 13.7 billion years ago. That’s just 100 million years from the Big Bang, when the universe was created
In addition to making stellar observations, webb will scan the atmospheres of alien worlds for possible signs of life.
The high-flying drama began within days of takeoff.
A sunshade the size of a tennis court opened on the telescope in early January, a week and a half after the Christmas launch from French Guiana. The observatory’s 6.5-meter-wide gold-coated mirror was unfurled a few days later.
Monday’s thruster firing put the telescope in orbit around the sun at the so-called second Lagrange point, where the gravitational forces of the sun and Earth balance. The 7-tonne spacecraft always faces the night side of the blue planet to keep its infrared detectors as cool as possible.
“Wow, what a trip last month,” said Amber Straughn, NASA’s deputy project scientist.
Considered the successor of Hubble, orbiting at a height of 530 kilometres, webb it’s too far away for emergency repairs. That makes the milestones of last month, and the ones to come, even more critical.
Spacewalking astronauts performed surgeries five times in the Hubble.The first operation, in 1993, corrected the blurred vision of the telescope, a defect caused during the construction of the mirror on the ground.
Whether they pursue optical and ultralight light, such as Hubble, or infrared, as webb, telescopes can see farther and more clearly when operating above Earth’s distorted atmosphere. That’s why NASA partnered with the European and Canadian space agencies to bring the telescope and its enormous mirror, the largest ever launched into the cosmos.
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