HEART OF WEB TELESCOPE SURVIVES DEEP SPACE TEST

FROM:  NASA 

After 116 days of being subjected to extremely frigid temperatures like that in space, the heart of the James Webb Space Telescope, the Integrated Science Instrument Module (ISIM) and its sensitive instruments, emerged unscathed from the thermal vacuum chamber at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The Webb telescope's images will reveal the first galaxies forming 13.5 billion years ago. The telescope will also pierce through interstellar dust clouds to capture stars and planets forming in our own galaxy. At the telescope's final destination in space, one million miles away from Earth, it will operate at incredibly cold temperatures of -387 degrees Fahrenheit, or 40 degrees Kelvin. This is 260 degrees Fahrenheit colder than any place on the Earth’s surface has ever been. To create temperatures that cold on Earth, the team uses the massive thermal vacuum chamber at Goddard called the Space Environment Simulator, or SES, that duplicates the vacuum and extreme temperatures of space. This 40-foot-tall, 27-foot-diameter cylindrical chamber eliminates the tiniest trace of air with vacuum pumps and uses liquid nitrogen and even colder liquid helium to drop the temperature simulating the space environment. The James Webb Space Telescope is the scientific successor to NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. It will be the most powerful space telescope ever built. Webb is an international project led by NASA with its partners, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.  NASA Webb's Heart Survives Deep Freeze Test.  Image Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn.

ASSEMBLY OF THE JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE

A crane in a clean room at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., lowers a test mass simulator (center of frame) onto the Ambient Optical Assembly Stand or AOAS to ensure it can support the James Webb Space Telescope's Optical Telescope Element during its assembly.  Image Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

FROM:  NASA 

Dropping in on a James Webb Space Telescope Clean Room Test
The James Webb Space Telescope is a large space telescope, optimized for infrared wavelengths. It is scheduled for launch later in this decade. Webb will find the first galaxies that formed in the early Universe, connecting the Big Bang to our own Milky Way galaxy. Webb will peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems, connecting the Milky Way to our own solar system. Webb's instruments will be designed to work primarily in the infrared range of the electromagnetic spectrum, with some capability in the visible range.

Webb will have a large mirror, 6.5 meters (21.3 feet) in diameter, and a sunshield the size of a tennis court. The mirror and sunshade won't fit into a rocket fully open, so both will be folded and open once Webb is in outer space. Webb will reside in an orbit about 1.5 million km (1 million miles) from Earth at the second Lagrange point.

The James Webb Space Telescope was named after a former NASA administrator.

FLIGHT INSTRUMENT DELIVERED FOR JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE

Photo Credit:  NASA
FROM:  NASA
WASHINGTON -- The first of four instruments to fly aboard NASA's James

Webb Space Telescope (Webb) has been delivered to NASA. The
Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) will allow scientists to study cold
and distant objects in greater detail than ever before.

MIRI arrived at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.,
May 29. It has been undergoing inspection before being integrated
into Webb’s science instrument payload known as the Integrated
Science Instrument Module (ISIM).

Assembled at and shipped from the Science and Technology Facilities
Council's Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in the United Kingdom, MIRI
was developed by a consortium of 10 European institutions and NASA's
Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., after having
been handed over to the European Space Agency.

MIRI will observe light with wavelengths in the mid-infrared range of
5 microns to 28 microns, which is a longer wavelength than human eyes
can detect. It is the only instrument of the four with this
particular ability to observe the physical processes occurring in the
cosmos.
"MIRI will enable Webb to distinguish the oldest galaxies from more
evolved objects that have undergone several cycles of star birth and
death," said Matt Greenhouse, ISIM project scientist at Goddard.
"MIRI also will provide a unique window into the birth places of
stars which are typically enshrouded by dust that shorter wavelength
light cannot penetrate."

MIRI's sensitive detectors will allow it to observe light, cool stars
in very distant galaxies; unveil newly forming stars within our Milky
Way; find signatures of the formation of planets around stars other
than our own; and take imagery and spectroscopy of planets, comets
and the outermost bits of debris in our solar system. MIRI's images
will enable scientists to study an object’s shape and structure.

The most powerful space telescope ever built, Webb is the successor to
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Webb’s four instruments will reveal
how the universe evolved from the Big Bang to the formation of our
solar system. Webb is a joint project of NASA, the European Space
Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.