James Webb Space Telescope And The Search For Our Distant Past

[Tiberius]

Pretty cool...if it works. These people won't be sleeping much until that thing is up and working a million miles from home 

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/james-webb-space-telescope-60-minutes-2021-12-12/

Edited February 14, 2022 by Tiberius

[Tiberius]

Quote

This December 22, may become known as the day the universe changed. That Wednesday, NASA expects to launch the James Webb Space Telescope, the largest and most expensive instrument ever flown. One hundred times more powerful than the 31-year-old Hubble Telescope, Webb can see back in time all the way to the "let there be light" moment—that instant when a cold, dark universe ignited into stars.

 

[The Poojer]

my mind cannot comprehend the ability to look 'back in time' 😵

 

31 minutes ago, Tiberius said:

 

[Doc]

12 minutes ago, The Poojer said:

my mind cannot comprehend the ability to look 'back in time' 😵

 

Like it says in the article, think about seeing the sun and how that's 8 minutes earlier.  The farther away something is, the more in the past what you're seeing of it it is.

[sherpa]

So many incredible things about this scope.

It will take nearly six months to get fully deployed and have the science working on it.

Orbital point is at Lagrange 2, which is about a million miles from earth and synchronized to earth's orbit around the sun, and protected by a massive heat shield.

 

What gives it it's unique ability is that it senses IR signals instead of visual light, like Hubbell.

So many things have to go right, as there is no way to fix it, other than what it can do internally.

Super exciting to watch this process.

 

 

 

[Ridgewaycynic2013]

Just don't point it towards Earth, and clearly reveal that it's flat. 🤨

[Tiberius]

7 minutes ago, sherpa said:

So many incredible things about this scope.

It will take nearly six months to get fully deployed and have the science working on it.

Orbital point is at Lagrange 2, which is about a million miles from earth and synchronized to earth's orbit around the sun, and protected by a massive heat shield.

 

What gives it it's unique ability is that it senses IR signals instead of visual light, like Hubbell.

So many things have to go right, as there is no way to fix it, other than what it can do internally.

Super exciting to watch this process.

 

 

 

Hubble was broken when it went up, so sh it can go wrong. But they could go up and work on it. That New Herizons space craft sent to Pluto went dark a few days before it was to pass by and then thankfully rebooted. Ya, if this thing has a problem, it's not going to get fixed. 

[The Poojer]

Yeah, that's pretty incredible

 

15 minutes ago, Doc said:

 

Like it says in the article, think about seeing the sun and how that's 8 minutes earlier.  The farther away something is, the more in the past what you're seeing of it it is.

[WhoTom]

3 hours ago, The Poojer said:

my mind cannot comprehend the ability to look 'back in time' 😵

 

 

3 hours ago, Doc said:

 

Like it says in the article, think about seeing the sun and how that's 8 minutes earlier.  The farther away something is, the more in the past what you're seeing of it it is.

 

3 hours ago, The Poojer said:

Yeah, that's pretty incredible

 

 

Every time you watch a Bills game on TV, you're experiencing the same thing on a smaller scale. It takes time for the cameras to convert the light to electricity, time to convert that signal to radio waves (or digitize it), time for the waves to reach the satellite and back (or your antenna) or for the digital signal to stream and reach your modem/router, etc.

 

So when you watch the Bills on TV in "real-time," there's a lag. In effect, you're seeing what happened a few seconds ago and, therefore, looking back in time.

[Success]

They've put over a decade into this.  I can't imagine how it must feel for them while they're waiting to see if it all goes as planned - I'm nervous, and I'm not even involved.

 

It will greatly expand our knowledge of the cosmos if all goes well. I'm stoked.

 

[Warcodered]

6 hours ago, WhoTom said:

 

 

 

Every time you watch a Bills game on TV, you're experiencing the same thing on a smaller scale. It takes time for the cameras to convert the light to electricity, time to convert that signal to radio waves (or digitize it), time for the waves to reach the satellite and back (or your antenna) or for the digital signal to stream and reach your modem/router, etc.

 

So when you watch the Bills on TV in "real-time," there's a lag. In effect, you're seeing what happened a few seconds ago and, therefore, looking back in time.

I mean literally everything you see is reflected light so all of it is something that has already happened.

[TBBills]

I have been waiting for this for years.

 

I cannot wait to see the pictures.

Edited December 14, 2021 by TBBills

[Wacka]

For the Hubble picture, it took months for them to process the picture.  They have to take them through red, green and blue filters and then  combine them to and get the color levels correct. 

I have a friend ( Buffalonian and UB Grad) that was the head of the office at the Goddard Space Fight Center in Grenbelt, MD that directed where to point the Hubble.  He mentioned to me that they had a photo that would blow everyone away. That was in December that year. In the summer they published the "Pillars of Creation" photo. Took them that long to make sure everything was aligned and calibrated.

He eventually left there and today one of his twin sons  has that job.

[Nextmanup]

[Marv's Neighbor]

14 hours ago, Tiberius said:

 

Hopefully it will have more initial success than Hubble.  As I recall, Hubble needed a vision correction before it became really useful.

[sherpa]

8 hours ago, Wacka said:

For the Hubble picture, it took months for them to process the picture.  They have to take them through red, green and blue filters and then  combine them to and get the color levels correct. 

 

 

Yes. Hubbell pictures are black and white or greyscale, more accurately.

The spectacular images published are after processing, which is not to say they are not accurate.

The scope has numerous filters and after taking pictures with a number of them, and seeing how much light passes through in each wavelength range, they can get a sense of the true color and then apply that to complete the final image.

 

Hubbell's initial problem was due to an error in testing equipment which ultimately led to the misplacing of the primary mirror, and thus, blurry images.

Fortunately an ingenious fix was arrived at, resulting in the fabulous images we have enjoyed for years.

Such a fix won't be possible at Webb's orbit location.

 

[Bad Things]

My brother played a part in the Hubble "fix", making some very high spec'd optics for it.

[Simon]

Launch delayed by two days due to a data uplink issue.

Now scheduled to launch on Dec 24.

Heads up, Santa!

 

[Mike in Horseheads]

On 12/14/2021 at 12:22 AM, Marv's Neighbor said:

Hopefully it will have more initial success than Hubble.  As I recall, Hubble needed a vision correction before it became really useful.

Nothing says SpaceX couldn't try?

[Gugny]

On 12/13/2021 at 10:25 AM, The Poojer said:

Yeah, that's pretty incredible

 

 

I wonder how clearly they'll be able to see Uranus.