Prepare for
astounding investigation, for the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) has
elaborated the 13 proposals that will compromise the initial set of scientific
observations carried out by the highly anticipated James Webb Space Telescope
(JWST). The James Webb Space Telescope
is a component of NASA’s Next Generation Telescope program that is to be
launched in 2021, developed by NASA, Canadian Space Agency, and the European
Space Agency.
JWST will
ultimately provide unprecedented resolution and amazing sensitivity from the
long-wavelength visible light through the mid-infrared range.
John C.
Mather, senior project scientist for the Webb telescope and senior
astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland spoke
out about the telescope in a news release: “I’m thrilled to see the list of
astronomer’s most fascinating targets for the Webb telescope and extremely
eager to see the results. We fully expect to be surprised by what we find.”
The
telescope will facilitate a wide scope of research to be conducted, such as
solar observations, to some of the most distant galaxies currently on record.
All four of the instruments of the JWST will be utilized and its incredible
abilities will be thoroughly demonstrated. Surprise and beauty is expected.
Obviously,
physicists and astronomers are excited and looking forward to use the JWST and
rightly so. The level of thrill is so high that the STScI received eight times
higher the average amount of requests for subscription to the Early Release
period than it could facilitate. “It is a highly competitive field,” Neill Reid
of the STScI revealed to Futurism.
Niell Reid
also went on to say: “Webb is a six-and-a-half meters. There’s orders of
magnitude increase in sensitivity with that, so there’s really an enormous area
of discovery space. You can do bright objects much much faster. You can do much
fainter objects than you could have ever done before with any telescope.”
Deputy
senior project scientist for the JSWT also added onto the conversation: “In
order to see things fainter, we need a larger telescope to collect more light.”
According to
Gardner, the JWST possess several advantages over the Hubble Telescope,
especially with its major strength being able to see back in time, allowing
scientists to observe and analyze remote, dull galaxies in their early
formations. Another reason for JWST’s growing popularity is its operation time
is limited-- to miss the chance of potentially operating is upsetting, to say
the least.
Reid spoke out on the reason as to why the time frame exists, saying that: “the limiting factor for Webb is basically fuel. Because it’s working in infrared, all of the instruments need to be kept really cold. The way that that’s done is not by using liquid nitrogen or anything like that-- there’s a giant Sun shade that unfolds, basically puts the telescope into the shade.”
Properly
operating the sunshade and moving between different objects demands the
adjustment of the telescope’s orbit which uses rocket fuel. This means that the
JWST is to operate for at least five years, but the team remains hopeful that
the telescope will prevail for at least 10 years of operation.
Despite the
short period of operation, the JWST is expected to deliver new, innovating
information regarding exoplanets.
The reason
as to why this belief is in place is due to the several spectrographs operating
at infrared and near-infrared wavelengths which enables researchers to probe
regions that previously deemed the title “unaccessible” in the scavenge for
relatively small exoplanets.
According to
Neill Reid, researchers are now gifted the power to study the planet’s
atmospheres with an amount of precision that hasn’t existed before. Gardner
also praised the telescope, telling Futurism about a program chosen to be part
of the Early Release period that will utilize the coronagraphy process.
Coronagraphy allows scientists to observe the characteristics of the planet’s
atmospheres as they travel in front of their stars.
“One of the
most exciting things, I think, is that as the planets is transiting the star,
the light from the star actually goes through the atmosphere of the planet and
reaches our telescope. When we subtract that out, we can get a direct spectrum
of the atmosphere and determine its constituents.”
Do expect
more-- these are only the earliest plans for the JWST and after taking into
consideration the fact that the telescope is hypothesized to operate for at
least a decade, JWST could provide a much more universal amount of information
and insights to the scientific community before its final days.
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