Controllers at the Space Telescope Science Institute celebrate the deployment of the mirror.
Scientists intend to use the $ 10 billion observatory and its extraordinary mirror to capture events that occurred just a couple hundred million years after the Big Bang. They want to see the first stars that illuminate the Universe.
They will also train the telescope’s great “eye” on the atmospheres of distant planets to see if those worlds could be habitable.
“Webb has the potential to surprise people, even people who are used to images from the Hubble Space Telescope, and I know it’s hard to imagine,” said Lee Feinberg, who led the development team for the Webb mirror at the NASA, the US space agency.
“Webb is so powerful; almost anywhere we look we are going to break new ground in a tremendous way“he told BBC News.
Webb was shipped with the sides of his main mirror folded up like a drop-leaf table.
The telescope is a joint project of the American, European and Canadian space agencies. It has taken 30 years to design and build, and it will continue revelations from Hubble, which is now nearing the end of its operational life.
Webb carries state-of-the-art technologies. It is also much larger. It is so large that it had to be compacted to fit inside the warhead of the rocket that launched it into orbit on December 25.
The unfolding over the past two weeks had everyone holding their breath. But the complex series of deployments, which included that of a parasol the size of a tennis court, passed without drama.
It will go down in the history of space exploration as an astonishing achievement.
The controllers, operating out of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, completed the rearrangement sequence by rotating the two “wings” of the main mirror 90 degrees.
Telemetry transmitted from Webb confirmed that the second of these side panels had been locked and locked in place at 18:16 GMT.
“We have a fully deployed JWST (James Webb Space Telescope) observatory,” announced Carl Starr, mission operations manager at STScI.
“The last two weeks have been totally amazing,” added Bill Ochs, NASA’s Webb program manager. “Thousands of people have worked at JWST to get us to this point. I will tell you every day that I am honored to be associated with this team.”
And addressing the controllers, Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA’s science director, said: “We have a telescope deployed in orbit, a magnificent telescope that the world has never seen. So, How does it feel to make history for everyone?“.
It’s time for astronomers to breathe a sigh of relief.
Launch is usually the most tense part of a mission, but the last two weeks have been even more stressful. Deploying a telescope of such colossal proportions has been one of the greatest challenges ever attempted in space..
But the Webb team did. And, in fact, it went so well that they made the task look easy. Decades of work on the telescope’s design and innovative engineering have clearly paid off.
However, the real proof of the power of the observatory will not come until this summer, when the first images are captured and transmitted to Earth. Y expectations are very highNot only should the views be spectacular, but they could also answer some of the biggest questions, like how did our Universe start and does life exist beyond Earth?
Much work remains to be done before James Webb is ready to image the Universe. The initial task is simply to let it cool very much.
The telescope is designed to work in the infrared. It is at this longer wavelength of light (longer than we can see with our eyes) that pioneer stars will be observed to shine. But unless Webb is reduced to a super low temperature, his own thermal energy will flood the weakest of signals.
“We would be erasing what we want to see; it would be like trying to look at a lit match in front of a burning haystack. You would be lost,” said Gillian Wright, one of Webb’s principal investigators.
The Hubble images transformed our view of the cosmos. Webb’s should be no less impressive.
The large shield will cast a shadow from the Sun that will eventually put Webb below -230 ° C.
Only in this frigid condition will the four scientific instruments on board have the required sensitivity.
Engineers will begin verifying its function and performance shortly. They will also need to align the 18 hexagonal segments on the main mirror so that they behave as a single monolithic reflective surface.
Each of the segments have motors at the rear that can move them up and down, tilt them sideways, twist them, and even bend them slightly to give them exactly the right curvature.
All this preparatory work will occupy the next five months, about. The first public release of Webb images is not expected until late June at the earliest. But we must be prepared to be surprised, say space agency officials.
“Webb is an engineering marvel, but he also has this beauty,” enthused Lee Feinberg.
“One of my favorite things was looking at people’s faces when they came up and looked at it. There is a sense of wonder that humans created this. It’s just the size, the scale, and the gold linings. It really lifts you up.” he told BBC News.
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