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JWST - Blog Posts
Cosmic Cliffs in Carina © JWST
have you seen the JWST images of the pillars of creation? i could cry just looking at them. they’re so beautiful.
looking at them i get so emotional. i can’t believe i am lucky enough to be alive in this time of beginning to understand the cosmos.
(second half has been rotated to match orientation of the first)
once i am well enough i will be going to college for astrophysics. i cannot wait to be who i know i can be.
The James Webb Space Telescope has just completed a successful first year of science. Let’s celebrate by seeing the birth of Sun-like stars in this brand-new image from the Webb telescope!
This is a small star-forming region in the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex. At 390 light-years away, it's the closest star-forming region to Earth. There are around 50 young stars here, all of them similar in mass to the Sun, or smaller. The darkest areas are the densest, where thick dust cocoons still-forming protostars. Huge red bipolar jets of molecular hydrogen dominate the image, appearing horizontally across the upper third and vertically on the right. These occur when a star first bursts through its natal envelope of cosmic dust, shooting out a pair of opposing jets into space like a newborn first stretching her arms out into the world. In contrast, the star S1 has carved out a glowing cave of dust in the lower half of the image. It is the only star in the image that is significantly more massive than the Sun.
Thanks to Webb’s sensitive instruments, we get to witness moments like this at the beginning of a star’s life. One year in, Webb’s science mission is only just getting started. The second year of observations has already been selected, with plans to build on an exciting first year that exceeded expectations. Here’s to many more years of scientific discovery with Webb.
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Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Klaus Pontoppidan (STScI)
Space Craft! Make NASA-Inspired Creations for World Embroidery Day
It’s time to get crafty with some needle and thread. At NASA, we hope to inspire art of all kinds. To highlight #WorldEmbroideryDay on July 30, we want to know: does our imagery inspire you? Show us your art and we may feature it on social media.
How?
Search for a NASA image that inspires you. Here are a few places to get you started: Hubble, James Webb Space Telescope, Ocean Color, Landsat and Earth Observatory
Create. Over the years, we've seen a growing number of embroidered pieces that showcase our organization's research, especially with needlepoint.
Share your creation, along with the image it was inspired by, on social media using the hashtag #NASAEmbroidery. We will share selected pieces on July 30 for World Embroidery Day
Why?
NASA imagery has many functions. From studying distant galaxies to tracking ocean health, our scientists use these images to not only monitor our home planet, but better understand life beyond our solar system.
Embroidery is an ancient craft that has experienced a revival over the years. It involves decorating fabric or other materials using a needle to apply thread or yarn. Have you recently taken up embroidery? What images are you inspired by? We’d love to see it.
Image Resources for #NASAEmbroidery Inspiration
NASA Images
Hubble Image Gallery
NASA’s Ocean Color Image Gallery
James Webb Space Telescope
Landsat Image Gallery
Create and Share Your #NASAEmbroidery
Take a picture of your piece and upload it to Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr or Facebook. Make sure you use the hashtag #NASAEmbroidery so we know that you are taking part in the event and make sure that your privacy permissions allow us to view your post.
If the piece catches our eye, we may share your work on NASA’s main social media accounts as well as theme-related ones. We may also feature your art in a NASA Flickr gallery and our Tumblr pages. We’ll contact you directly to grant us permission to feature your work. You can follow @NASA on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook for embroidery creations, which will be featured from July 30-Aug. 1
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Of course Saturn brought its ring light.
On June 25, 2023, our James Webb Space Telescope made its first near-infrared observations of Saturn. The planet itself appears extremely dark at this infrared wavelength, since methane gas absorbs almost all the sunlight falling on the atmosphere. The icy rings, however, stay relatively bright, leading to Saturn’s unusual appearance in this image.
This new image of Saturn clearly shows details within the planet’s ring system, several of the planet’s moons (Dione, Enceladus, and Tethys), and even Saturn’s atmosphere in surprising and unexpected detail.
These observations from Webb are just a hint at what this observatory will add to Saturn’s story in the coming years as the science team delves deep into the data to prepare peer-reviewed results.
Download the full-resolution image, both labeled and unlabeled, from the Space Telescope Science Institute.
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Sakura to Supernova
This rare sight is a super-bright, massive Wolf-Rayet star. Calling forth the ephemeral nature of cherry blossoms, the Wolf-Rayet phase is a fleeting stage that only some stars go through soon before they explode.
The star, WR 124, is 15,000 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. It is 30 times the mass of the Sun and has shed 10 Suns worth of material – so far. As the ejected gas moves away from the star and cools, cosmic dust forms and glows in the infrared light detectable by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope.
The origin of cosmic dust that can survive a supernova blast is of great interest to astronomers for multiple reasons. Dust shelters forming stars, gathers together to help form planets, and serves as a platform for molecules to form and clump together, including the building blocks of life on Earth.
Stars like WR 124 also help astronomers understand the early history of the universe. Similar dying stars first seeded the young universe with heavy elements forged in their cores – elements that are now common in the current era, including on Earth.
The James Webb Space Telescope opens up new possibilities for studying details in cosmic dust, which is best observed in infrared wavelengths of light. Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera balances the brightness of WR 124’s stellar core and the knotty details in the fainter surrounding gas. The telescope’s Mid-Infrared Instrument reveals the clumpy structure of the gas and dust nebula of the ejected material now surrounding the star.
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Meet Our Superhero Space Telescopes!
While the first exoplanets—planets beyond our solar system—were discovered using ground-based telescopes, the view was blurry at best. Clouds, moisture, and jittering air molecules all got in the way, limiting what we could learn about these distant worlds.
A superhero team of space telescopes has been working tirelessly to discover exoplanets and unveil their secrets. Now, a new superhero has joined the team—the James Webb Space Telescope. What will it find? Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
To capture finer details—detecting atmospheres on small, rocky planets like Earth, for instance, to seek potential signs of habitability—astronomers knew they needed what we might call “superhero” space telescopes, each with its own special power to explore our universe. Over the past few decades, a team of now-legendary space telescopes answered the call: Hubble, Chandra, Spitzer, Kepler, and TESS.
Much like scientists, space telescopes don't work alone. Hubble observes in visible light—with some special features (superpowers?)—Chandra has X-ray vision, and TESS discovers planets by looking for tiny dips in the brightness of stars.
Kepler and Spitzer are now retired, but we're still making discoveries in the space telescopes' data. Legends! All were used to tell us more about exoplanets. Spitzer saw beyond visible light into the infrared and was able to make exoplanet weather maps! Kepler discovered more than 3,000 exoplanets.
Three space telescopes studied one fascinating planet and told us different things. Hubble found that the atmosphere of HD 189733 b is a deep blue. Spitzer estimated its temperature at 1,700 degrees Fahrenheit (935 degrees Celsius). Chandra, measuring the planet’s transit using X-rays from its star, showed that the gas giant’s atmosphere is distended by evaporation.
Adding the James Webb Space Telescope to the superhero team will make our science stronger. Its infrared views in increased ranges will make the previously unseen visible.
Soon, Webb will usher in a new era in understanding exoplanets. What will Webb discover when it studies HD 189733 b? We can’t wait to find out! Super, indeed.
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See the Universe in a New Way with the Webb Space Telescope's First Images
Are you ready to see unprecedented, detailed views of the universe from the James Webb Space Telescope, the largest and most powerful space observatory ever made? Scroll down to see the first full-color images and data from Webb. Unfold the universe with us. ✨
Carina Nebula
This landscape of “mountains” and “valleys” speckled with glittering stars, called the Cosmic Cliffs, is the edge of the star-birthing Carina Nebula. Usually, the early phases of star formation are difficult to capture, but Webb can peer through cosmic dust—thanks to its extreme sensitivity, spatial resolution, and imaging capability. Protostellar jets clearly shoot out from some of these young stars in this new image.
Southern Ring Nebula
The Southern Ring Nebula is a planetary nebula: it’s an expanding cloud of gas and dust surrounding a dying star. In this new image, the nebula’s second, dimmer star is brought into full view, as well as the gas and dust it’s throwing out around it. (The brighter star is in its own stage of stellar evolution and will probably eject its own planetary nebula in the future.) These kinds of details will help us better understand how stars evolve and transform their environments. Finally, you might notice points of light in the background. Those aren’t stars—they’re distant galaxies.
Stephan’s Quintet
Stephan’s Quintet, a visual grouping of five galaxies near each other, was discovered in 1877 and is best known for being prominently featured in the holiday classic, “It’s a Wonderful Life.” This new image brings the galaxy group from the silver screen to your screen in an enormous mosaic that is Webb’s largest image to date. The mosaic covers about one-fifth of the Moon’s diameter; it contains over 150 million pixels and is constructed from almost 1,000 separate image files. Never-before-seen details are on display: sparkling clusters of millions of young stars, fresh star births, sweeping tails of gas, dust and stars, and huge shock waves paint a dramatic picture of galactic interactions.
WASP-96 b
WASP-96 b is a giant, mostly gas planet outside our solar system, discovered in 2014. Webb’s Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS) measured light from the WASP-96 system as the planet moved across the star. The light curve confirmed previous observations, but the transmission spectrum revealed new properties of the planet: an unambiguous signature of water, indications of haze, and evidence of clouds in the atmosphere. This discovery marks a giant leap forward in the quest to find potentially habitable planets beyond Earth.
Webb's First Deep Field
This image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723, known as Webb’s First Deep Field, looks 4.6 billion years into the past. Looking at infrared wavelengths beyond Hubble’s deepest fields, Webb’s sharp near-infrared view reveals thousands of galaxies—including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared—in the most detailed view of the early universe to date. We can now see tiny, faint structures we’ve never seen before, like star clusters and diffuse features and soon, we’ll begin to learn more about the galaxies’ masses, ages, histories, and compositions.
These images and data are just the beginning of what the observatory will find. It will study every phase in the history of our Universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of solar systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System.
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Credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI
A View into the Past
Our Hubble Space Telescope just found the farthest individual star ever seen to date!
Nicknamed “Earendel” (“morning star” in Old English), this star existed within the first billion years after the universe’s birth in the big bang. Earendel is so far away from Earth that its light has taken 12.9 billion years to reach us, far eclipsing the previous single-star record holder whose light took 9 billion years to reach us.
Though Earendel is at least 50 times the mass of our Sun and millions of times as bright, we’d normally be unable to see it from Earth. However, the mass of a huge galaxy cluster between us and Earendel has created a powerful natural magnifying glass. Astronomers expect that the star will be highly magnified for years.
Earendel will be observed by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. Webb's high sensitivity to infrared light is needed to learn more about this star, because its light is stretched to longer infrared wavelengths due to the universe's expansion.
Ever wanted to look back in time? This week, we’re launching a kind of time machine – a telescope so powerful it will help us see back some of the first stars and galaxies made after the Big Bang.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the largest and most advanced telescope we’ve ever put in space. With revolutionary technology, it will study 13.5 billion years of cosmic history and help humanity understand our place in the stars.
Tomorrow, Dec. 25, at 7:20 a.m. ET (12:20 UTC), the Webb Telescope is set to launch from French Guiana, beginning a 29-day journey to a spot a million miles away.
How to Watch:
In English:
Dec. 25
Live coverage starts at 6:00 a.m. ET/11:00 UTC
Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Twitch
In Spanish:
Dec. 25
Live coverage starts at 6:30 a.m. ET/11:30 UTC
Facebook, YouTube, Twitter
Once Webb launches, the journey has only just begun. The telescope will begin a 2-week-long process of unfolding itself in space before settling in to explore the universe in ways we’ve never seen before.
Follow along on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram and with #UnfoldTheUniverse.
That’s a wrap! Thank you for all the wonderful questions. James Webb Space Telescope Planetary Scientist Dr. Naomi Rowe-Gurney answered questions about the science goals, capabilities, and her hopes for the world's most powerful telescope.
Check out her full Answer Time for more: Career | Science Goals | Capabilities
We hope you enjoyed today and learned something new about the Webb mission! Don’t miss the historic launch of this first-of-its kind space observatory. Tune in to NASA TV HERE on Dec. 22 starting at 7:20 a.m. EST (12:20 UTC).
If today’s Answer Time got you excited, explore all the ways you can engage with the mission before launch! Join our #UnfoldTheUniverse art challenge, our virtual social event with international space agencies, and countdown to liftoff with us. Check out all the ways to participate HERE.
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Questions coming up from….
@teamadamsperret: Congrats on your PhD!! When people ask what you do, what's your reply?
@Anonymous: How does it feel, working in NASA?
@moonlighy: How did you find your love for this job?
@redbullanddepression: what the prettiest star in the sky in your opinion? also, you are a great role model as a queer woman who is attending university next year to major in aerospace engineering!!!
Hi.dr.naomi.i have 2 questions.
1.Can this JAMES WEB T.S able to see Mercury, Venus and certain stars that are close to the sun either. I.
2.Why is the James Webb t.s.mirror yellow?
Any specific reason for this
When will we start seeing images from the James Webb telescope??
What would be the ideal discovery to make with the Webb Telescope? Or what would you love to find with it?
Hello. I'm curious what new feature the james webb brings to the table, like its ability to detect in infrared, that you are most excited about? What are you most interested to look into with this new telescope?
How exactly will it work? And whats the goal of the project?
Do you have any protections against asteroids?
Concerning the new telescope -out of curiosity- what is the maximum distance it can view planets, galaxies, objects, anything up to -in terms of common/metric measurement, and/or years (if applicable) etc.? -Rose
What does “chemical fingerprints” mean? What chemicals indicate possible life on other planets?
Will the James Webb Telescope also be able to spot out signs of life on habitable worlds?
Questions coming up from….
@maybeinanotherworld: JWST IS HAPPENING! How are all of you feeling about this?
@Anonymous: How powerful is this telescope, exactly?
@Anonymous: Why are the mirrors on it yellow?
@foeofcolor: How long is this estimated to last for? Like how long will it be able to function in space by estimates?
Who's ready to #UnfoldTheUniverse? The James Webb Space Telescope Answer Time with expert Dr. Naomi Rowe-Gurney is LIVE! Stay tuned for talks about the science goals, capabilities, and hopes for the world's most powerful telescope. View ALL the answers HERE.
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Decoding Nebulae
We can agree that nebulae are some of the most majestic-looking objects in the universe. But what are they exactly? Nebulae are giant clouds of gas and dust in space. They’re commonly associated with two parts of the life cycle of stars: First, they can be nurseries forming new baby stars. Second, expanding clouds of gas and dust can mark where stars have died.
Not all nebulae are alike, and their different appearances tell us what's happening around them. Since not all nebulae emit light of their own, there are different ways that the clouds of gas and dust reveal themselves. Some nebulae scatter the light of stars hiding in or near them. These are called reflection nebulae and are a bit like seeing a street lamp illuminate the fog around it.
In another type, called emission nebulae, stars heat up the clouds of gas, whose chemicals respond by glowing in different colors. Think of it like a neon sign hanging in a shop window!
Finally there are nebulae with dust so thick that we’re unable to see the visible light from young stars shine through it. These are called dark nebulae.
Our missions help us see nebulae and identify the different elements that oftentimes light them up.
The Hubble Space Telescope is able to observe the cosmos in multiple wavelengths of light, ranging from ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared. Hubble peered at the iconic Eagle Nebula in visible and infrared light, revealing these grand spires of dust and countless stars within and around them.
The Chandra X-ray Observatory studies the universe in X-ray light! The spacecraft is helping scientists see features within nebulae that might otherwise be hidden by gas and dust when viewed in longer wavelengths like visible and infrared light. In the Crab Nebula, Chandra sees high-energy X-rays from a pulsar (a type of rapidly spinning neutron star, which is the crushed, city-sized core of a star that exploded as a supernova).
The James Webb Space Telescope will primarily observe the infrared universe. With Webb, scientists will peer deep into clouds of dust and gas to study how stars and planetary systems form.
The Spitzer Space Telescope studied the cosmos for over 16 years before retiring in 2020. With the help of its detectors, Spitzer revealed unknown materials hiding in nebulae — like oddly-shaped molecules and soot-like materials, which were found in the California Nebula.
Studying nebulae helps scientists understand the life cycle of stars. Did you know our Sun got its start in a stellar nursery? Over 4.5 billion years ago, some gas and dust in a nebula clumped together due to gravity, and a baby Sun was born. The process to form a baby star itself can take a million years or more!
After billions more years, our Sun will eventually puff into a huge red giant star before leaving behind a beautiful planetary nebula (so-called because astronomers looking through early telescopes thought they resembled planets), along with a small, dense object called a white dwarf that will cool down very slowly. In fact, we don’t think the universe is old enough yet for any white dwarfs to have cooled down completely.
Since the Sun will live so much longer than us, scientists can't observe its whole life cycle directly ... but they can study tons of other stars and nebulae at different phases of their lives and draw conclusions about where our Sun came from and where it's headed. While studying nebulae, we’re seeing the past, present, and future of our Sun and trillions of others like it in the cosmos.
To keep up with the most recent cosmic news, follow NASA Universe on Twitter and Facebook.
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10 Ways the Webb Telescope ‘Trains’ for Space
The James Webb Space Telescope will peer at the first stars and galaxies as a cosmic time machine, look beyond to distant worlds, and unlock the mysteries of the universe. But before it can do any of those things, it needs to “train” for traveling to its destination — 1 million miles away from Earth!
So how does Webb get ready for space while it’s still on the ground? Practice makes perfect. Different components of the telescope were first tested on their own, but now a fully-assembled Webb is putting all of its training together. Here are 10 types of tests that Webb went through to prepare for its epic journey:
1. Sounding Off
A rocket launch is 100 times more intense and four times louder than a rock concert! (That’s according to Paul Geithner, Webb’s deputy project manager – technical.) To simulate that level of extreme noise, Webb’s full structure was blasted with powerful sound waves during its observatory-level acoustic testing in August.
2. Shaking It Up
Webb will also have to withstand a super-bumpy ride as it launches — like a plane takeoff, but with a lot more shaking! The observatory was carefully folded into its launch position, placed onto a shaker table, and vibrated from 5 to 100 times per second to match the speeds of Webb’s launch vehicle, an Ariane 5 rocket.
3. All Systems Go
In July, Webb performed a rigorous test of its software and electrical systems as a fully connected telescope. Each line of code for Webb was tested and then retested as different lines were combined into Webb’s larger software components. To complete this test, Webb team members were staffed 24 hours a day for 15 consecutive days!
4. Hanging Out
After launch, Webb is designed to unfold (like origami in reverse) from its folded launch position into its operational form. Without recharging, the telescope’s onboard battery would only last a few hours, so it will be up to Webb’s 20-foot solar array to harness the Sun’s energy for all of the telescope’s electrical needs. To mimic the zero-gravity conditions of space, Webb technicians tested the solar array by hanging it sideways.
5. Time to Stretch
The tower connects the upper and lower halves of Webb. Once Webb is in space, the tower will extend 48 inches (1.2 meters) upward to create a gap between the two halves of the telescope. Then all five layers of Webb’s sunshield will slowly unfurl and stretch out, forming what will look like a giant kite in space. Both the tower and sunshield will help different sections of Webb maintain their ideal temperatures.
For these steps, engineers designed an ingenious system of cables, pulleys and weights to counter the effects of Earth’s gravity. 6. Dance of the Mirrors
Unfolding Webb’s mirrors will involve some dance-like choreography. First, a support structure will gracefully unfold to place the circular secondary mirror out in front of the primary mirror. Although small, the secondary mirror will play a big role: focusing light from the primary mirror to send to Webb’s scientific instruments.
Next, Webb’s iconic primary mirror will fully extend so that all 18 hexagonal segments are in view. At 6.5 meters (21 feet 4-inches) across, the mirror’s massive size is key for seeing in sharp detail. Like in tower and sunshield testing, the Webb team offloaded the weight of both mirrors with cables, pulleys and weights so that they unfolded as if weightless in space.
7. Do Not Disturb
Before a plane takeoff, it’s important for us to turn off our cell phones to make sure that their electromagnetic waves won’t interfere with navigation signals. Similarly, Webb had to test that its scientific instruments wouldn’t disrupt the electromagnetic environment of the spacecraft. This way, when we get images back from Webb, we’ll know that we’re seeing actual objects in space instead of possible blips caused by electromagnetic interference. These tests took place in the Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) Lab, which looks like a futuristic sound booth! Instead of absorbing sound, however, the walls of this chamber help keep electromagnetic waves from bouncing around.
8. Phoning Earth
How will Webb know where to go and what to look at? Thanks to Webb’s Ground Segment Tests, we know that we’ll be able to “talk” to Webb after liftoff. In the first six hours after launch, the telescope needs to seamlessly switch between different communication networks and stations located around the world. Flight controllers ran through these complex procedures in fall 2018 to help ensure that launch will be a smooth success.
After Webb reaches its destination, operators will use the Deep Space Network, an international array of giant radio antennas, to relay commands that tell Webb where to look. To test this process when Webb isn’t in space yet, the team used special equipment to imitate the real radio link that will exist between the observatory and the network.
9. Hot and Cold
Between 2017 and 2019, Webb engineers separately tested the two halves of the telescope in different thermal vacuum chambers, which are huge, climate-controlled rooms drained of air to match the vacuum of space. In testing, the spacecraft bus and sunshield half were exposed to both boiling hot and freezing cold temperatures, like the conditions that they’ll encounter during Webb’s journey.
But Webb’s mirrors and instruments will need to be colder than cold to operate! This other half of Webb was tested in the historic Chamber A, which was used to test Apollo Moon mission hardware and specifically upgraded to fit Webb. Over about 100 days, Chamber A was gradually cooled down, held at cryogenic temperatures (about minus 387 F, or minus 232.8 C), and then warmed back up to room temperature.
10. Cosmic Vision
When the Hubble Space Telescope was first sent into space, its images were blurry due to a flaw with its mirror. This error taught us about the importance of comprehensively checking Webb’s “eyes” before the telescope gets out of reach.
Besides training for space survival, Webb also spent time in Chamber A undergoing mirror alignment and optical testing. The team used a piece of test hardware that acted as a source of artificial starlight to verify that light would travel correctly through Webb’s optical system.
Whew! That’s a lot of testing under Webb’s belt! Webb is set to launch in October 2021 from Kourou, French Guiana. But until then, it’s still got plenty of training left, including a final round of deployment tests before being shipped to its launch location.
Learn more about the James Webb Space Telescope HERE, or follow the mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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Three NASA Telescopes Look at an Angry Young Star Together
Science is a shared endeavor. We learn more when we work together. Today, July 18, we’re using three different space telescopes to observe the same star/planet system!
As our Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) enters its third year of observations, it's taking a new look at a familiar system this month. And today it won't be alone. Astronomers are looking at AU Microscopii, a young fiery nearby star – about 22 million years old – with the TESS, NICER and Swift observatories.
TESS will be looking for more transits – the passage of a planet across a star – of a recently-discovered exoplanet lurking in the dust of AU Microscopii (called AU Mic for short). Astronomers think there may be other worlds in this active system, as well!
Our Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) telescope on the International Space Station will also focus on AU Mic today. While NICER is designed to study neutron stars, the collapsed remains of massive stars that exploded as supernovae, it can study other X-ray sources, too. Scientists hope to observe stellar flares by looking at the star with its high-precision X-ray instrument.
Scientists aren't sure where the X-rays are coming from on AU Mic — it could be from a stellar corona or magnetic hot spots. If it's from hot spots, NICER might not see the planet transit, unless it happens to pass over one of those spots, then it could see a big dip!
A different team of astronomers will use our Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory to peer at AU Mic in X-ray and UV to monitor for high-energy flares while TESS simultaneously observes the transiting planet in the visible spectrum. Stellar flares like those of AU Mic can bathe planets in radiation.
Studying high-energy flares from AU Mic with Swift will help us understand the flare-rate over time, which will help with models of the planet’s atmosphere and the system’s space weather. There's even a (very) small chance for Swift to see a hint of the planet's transit!
The flares that a star produces can have a direct impact on orbiting planets' atmospheres. The high-energy photons and particles associated with flares can alter the chemical makeup of a planet's atmosphere and erode it away over time.
Another time TESS teamed up with a different spacecraft, it discovered a hidden exoplanet, a planet beyond our solar system called AU Mic b, with the now-retired Spitzer Space Telescope. That notable discovery inspired our latest poster! It’s free to download in English and Spanish.
Spitzer’s infrared instrument was ideal for peering at dusty systems! Astronomers are still using data from Spitzer to make discoveries. In fact, the James Webb Space Telescope will carry on similar study and observe AU Mic after it launches next year.
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#TBT to 1989 when Voyager 2 spotted Uranus looking like a seemingly perfect robin’s egg. 💙 When our Voyager 2 spacecraft flew by it in this image, one pole was pointing directly at the Sun. This means that no matter how much it spins, one half is completely in the sun at all times, and the other half is in total darkness.. Far-flung, Uranus – an ice giant of our solar system – is as mysterious as it is distant. Soon after its launch in 2021, our James Webb Space Telescope will change that by unlocking secrets of its atmosphere. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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The Science Goals of the James Webb Space Telescope
Our James Webb Space Telescope is an epic mission that will give us a window into the early universe, allowing us to see the time period during which the first stars and galaxies formed. Webb will not only change what we know, but also how we think about the night sky and our place in the cosmos. Want to learn more? Join two of our scientists as they talk about what the James Webb Telescope is, why it is being built and what it will help us learn about the universe…
First, meet Dr. Amber Straughn. She grew up in a small farming town in Arkansas, where her fascination with astronomy began under beautifully dark, rural skies. After finishing a PhD in Physics, she came to NASA Goddard to study galaxies using data from our Hubble Space Telescope. In addition to research, Amber's role with the Webb project’s science team involves working with Communications and Outreach activities. She is looking forward to using data from Webb in her research on galaxy formation and evolution.
We also talked with Dr. John Mather, the Senior Project Scientist for Webb, who leads our science team. He won a Nobel Prize in 2006 for confirming the Big Bang theory with extreme precision via a mission called the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) mission. John was the Principal Investigator (PI) of the Far IR Absolute Spectrophotometer (FIRAS) instrument on COBE. He’s an expert on cosmology, and infrared astronomy and instrumentation.
Now, let’s get to the science of Webb!
Dr. Amber Straughn: The James Webb Space Telescope at its core is designed to answer some of the biggest questions we have in astronomy today. And these are questions that go beyond just being science questions; they are questions that really get to the heart of who we are as human beings; questions like where do we come from? How did we get here? And, of course, the big one – are we alone?
To answer the biggest questions in astronomy today we really need a very big telescope. And the James Webb Space Telescope is the biggest telescope we’ve ever attempted to send into space. It sets us up with some really big engineering challenges.
Dr. John Mather: One of the wonderful challenges about astronomy is that we have to imagine something so we can go look for it. But nature has a way of being even more creative than we are, so we have always been surprised by what we see in the sky. That’s why building a telescope has always been interesting. Every time we build a better one, we see something we never imagined was out there. That’s been going on for centuries. This is the next step in that great series, of bigger and better and more powerful telescopes that surely will surprise us in some way that I can’t tell you.
It has never been done before, building a big telescope that will unfold in space. We knew we needed something that was bigger than the rocket to achieve the scientific discoveries that we wanted to make. We had to invent a new way to make the mirrors, a way to focus it out in outer space, several new kinds of infrared detectors, and we had to invent the big unfolding umbrella we call the sunshield.
Amber: One of Webb’s goals is to detect the very first stars and galaxies that were born in the very early universe. This is a part of the universe that we haven’t seen at all yet. We don’t know what’s there, so the telescope in a sense is going to open up this brand-new part of the universe, the part of the universe that got everything started.
John: The first stars and galaxies are really the big mystery for us. We don’t know how that happened. We don’t know when it happened. We don’t know what those stars were like. We have a pretty good idea that they were very much larger than the sun and that they would burn out in a tremendous burst of glory in just a few million years.
Amber: We also want to watch how galaxies grow and change over time. We have questions like how galaxies merge, how black holes form and how gas inflows and outflows affect galaxy evolution. But we’re really missing a key piece of the puzzle, which is how galaxies got their start.
John: Astronomy is one of the most observationally based sciences we’ve ever had. Everything we know about the sky has been a surprise. The ancients knew about the stars, but they didn’t know they were far away. They didn’t know they were like the Sun. Eventually we found that our own galaxy is one of hundreds of billions of galaxies and that the Universe is actually very old, but not infinitely old. So that was a big surprise too. Einstein thought, of course the Universe must have an infinite age, without a starting point. Well, he was wrong! Our intuition has just been wrong almost all the time. We’re pretty confident that we don’t know what we’re going to find.
Amber: As an astronomer one of the most exciting things about working on a telescope like this is the prospect of what it will tell us that we haven’t even thought of yet. We have all these really detailed science questions that we’ll ask, that we know to ask, and that we’ll answer. And in a sense that is what science is all about… in answering the questions we come up with more questions. There’s this almost infinite supply of questions, of things that we have to learn. So that’s why we build telescopes to get to this fundamental part of who we are as human beings. We’re explorers, and we want to learn about what our Universe is like.
Webb will be the world's premier space science observatory. It will solve mysteries in our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe – including our place in it. Webb is an international project we’re leading with our partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency.
To learn more about our James Webb Space Telescope, visit the website, or follow the mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.
The James Webb Space Telescope: Art + Science Continuing to Inspire
The James Webb Space Telescope – our next infrared space observatory – will not only change what we know, but also how we think about the night sky and our place in the cosmos. This epic mission to travel back in time to look back at the first stars and galaxies has inspired artists from around the world to create art inspired by the mission.
Image Credit: Anri Demchenko
It’s been exactly two years since the opening of the first James Webb Space Telescope Art + Science exhibit at the NASA Goddard Visitor Center. The exhibit was full of pieces created by artists who had the special opportunity to visit Goddard and view the telescope in person in late 2016.
Online Submission Image Credit: Tina Saramaga
Since the success of the event and exhibit, the Webb project has asked its followers to share any art they have created that was inspired by the mission. They have received over 125 submissions and counting!
Image Credit: Enrico Novelli
Online Submission Image Credit: Unni Isaksen
A selection of these submissions will be on display at NASA Goddard’s Visitor Center from now until at least the end of April 2019. The artists represented in this exhibit come not just from around the country, but from around the world, showing how art and science together can bring a love of space down to Earth.
More information about each piece in the exhibit can be found in our web gallery. Want to participate and share your own art? Tag your original art, inspired by the James Webb Space Telescope, on Twitter or Instagram with #JWSTArt, or email us through our website! For more info and rules, see: http://nasa.gov/jwstart.
Webb is the work of hands and minds from across the planet. We’re leading this international project with our partners from the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), and we’re all looking forward to its launch in 2021. Once in space, Webb will solve mysteries of our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it.
Learn more about the James Webb Space Telescope HERE, or follow the mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com
8 Common Questions About Our James Webb Space Telescope
You might have heard the basics about our James Webb Space Telescope, or Webb, and still have lots more questions! Here are more advanced questions we are frequently asked. (If you want to know the basics, read this Tumblr first!)
Webb is our upcoming infrared space observatory, which will launch in 2021. It will spy the first luminous objects that formed in the universe and shed light on how galaxies evolve, how stars and planetary systems are born, and how life could form on other planets.
1. Why is the mirror segmented?
The James Webb Space Telescope has a 6.5-meter (21.3-foot) diameter mirror, made from 18 individual segments. Webb needs to have an unfolding mirror because the mirror is so large that it otherwise cannot fit in the launch shroud of currently available rockets.
The mirror has to be large in order to see the faint light from the first star-forming regions and to see very small details at infrared wavelengths.
Designing, building, and operating a mirror that unfolds is one of the major technological developments of Webb. Unfolding mirrors will be necessary for future missions requiring even larger mirrors, and will find application in other scientific, civil, and military space missions.
2. Why are the mirrors hexagonal?
In short, the hexagonal shape allows a segmented mirror to be constructed with very small gaps, so the segments combine to form a roughly circular shape and need only three variations in prescription. If we had circular segments, there would be gaps between them.
Finally, we want a roughly circular overall mirror shape because that focuses the light into the most symmetric and compact region on the detectors.
An oval mirror, for example, would give images that are elongated in one direction. A square mirror would send a lot of the light out of the central region.
3. Is there a danger from micrometeoroids?
A micrometeoroid is a particle smaller than a grain of sand. Most never reach Earth's surface because they are vaporized by the intense heat generated by the friction of passing through the atmosphere. In space, no blanket of atmosphere protects a spacecraft or a spacewalker.
Webb will be a million miles away from the Earth orbiting what we call the second Lagrange point (L2). Unlike in low Earth orbit, there is not much space debris out there that could damage the exposed mirror.
But we do expect Webb to get impacted by these very tiny micrometeoroids for the duration of the mission, and Webb is designed to accommodate for them.
All of Webb's systems are designed to survive micrometeoroid impacts.
4. Why does the sunshield have five layers?
Webb has a giant, tennis-court sized sunshield, made of five, very thin layers of an insulating film called Kapton.
Why five? One big, thick sunshield would conduct the heat from the bottom to the top more than would a shield with five layers separated by vacuum. With five layers to the sunshield, each successive one is cooler than the one below.
The heat radiates out from between the layers, and the vacuum between the layers is a very good insulator. From studies done early in the mission development five layers were found to provide sufficient cooling. More layers would provide additional cooling, but would also mean more mass and complexity. We settled on five because it gives us enough cooling with some “margin” or a safety factor, and six or more wouldn’t return any additional benefits.
Fun fact: You could nearly boil water on the hot side of the sunshield, and it is frigid enough on the cold side to freeze nitrogen!
5. What kind of telescope is Webb?
Webb is a reflecting telescope that uses three curved mirrors. Technically, it’s called a three-mirror anastigmat.
6. What happens after launch? How long until there will be data?
We’ll give a short overview here, but check out our full FAQ for a more in-depth look.
In the first hour: About 30 minutes after liftoff, Webb will separate from the Ariane 5 launch vehicle. Shortly after this, we will talk with Webb from the ground to make sure everything is okay after its trip to space.
In the first day: After 24 hours, Webb will be nearly halfway to the Moon! About 2.5 days after launch, it will pass the Moon’s orbit, nearly a quarter of the way to Lagrange Point 1 (L2).
In the first week: We begin the major deployment of Webb. This includes unfolding the sunshield and tensioning the individual membranes, deploying the secondary mirror, and deploying the primary mirror.
In the first month: Deployment of the secondary mirror and the primary mirror occur. As the telescope cools in the shade of the sunshield, we turn on the warm electronics and initialize the flight software. As the telescope cools to near its operating temperature, parts of it are warmed with electronic heaters. This prevents condensation as residual water trapped within some of the materials making up the observatory escapes into space.
In the second month: We will turn on and operate Webb’s Fine Guidance Sensor, NIRCam, and NIRSpec instruments.
The first NIRCam image, which will be an out-of-focus image of a single bright star, will be used to identify each mirror segment with its image of a star in the camera. We will also focus the secondary mirror.
In the third month: We will align the primary mirror segments so that they can work together as a single optical surface. We will also turn on and operate Webb’s mid-infrared instrument (MIRI), a camera and spectrograph that views a wide spectrum of infrared light. By this time, Webb will complete its journey to its L2 orbit position.
In the fourth through the sixth month: We will complete the optimization of the telescope. We will test and calibrate all of the science instruments.
After six months: The first scientific images will be released, and Webb will begin its science mission and start to conduct routine science operations.
7. Why not assemble it in orbit?
Various scenarios were studied, and assembling in orbit was determined to be unfeasible.
We examined the possibility of in-orbit assembly for Webb. The International Space Station does not have the capability to assemble precision optical structures. Additionally, space debris that resides around the space station could have damaged or contaminated Webb’s optics. Webb’s deployment happens far above low Earth orbit and the debris that is found there.
Finally, if the space station were used as a stopping point for the observatory, we would have needed a second rocket to launch it to its final destination at L2. The observatory would have to be designed with much more mass to withstand this “second launch,” leaving less mass for the mirrors and science instruments.
8. Who is James Webb?
This telescope is named after James E. Webb (1906–1992), our second administrator. Webb is best known for leading Apollo, a series of lunar exploration programs that landed the first humans on the Moon.
However, he also initiated a vigorous space science program that was responsible for more than 75 launches during his tenure, including America's first interplanetary explorers.
Looking for some more in-depth FAQs? You can find them HERE.
Learn more about the James Webb Space Telescope HERE, or follow the mission on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!