The James Webb Space Telescope and other cool astronomy stuff!

July 12 and the telescope sends back one picture before experiencing another impact:

tesla

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And NASA targets all of Elon Musk’s satellites and destroys them with a heretofore unmentioned laser array in the ISS.
Looney Tunes Pranks GIF by Looney Tunes World of Mayhem

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Nah, Starman launched first, giving NASA plenty of time to work out an orbit that avoids him.

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“It’s blocking my view of Venus.”

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NIRISS (Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph) imaging (parallel only) checkout was completed on June 8. Fifteen modes to go!

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Two more checkouts were completed today! Thirteen to go!

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Here’s the page to bookmark to see the first images from JWST when they go live on July 12 beginning at 10:30am:

First Images from the James Webb Space Telescope

Image Release Day

Two more instrument modes checked out today, eleven to go!

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Jeez, you keep turning up with these like, an hour after I looked myself.

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Ditto. Every time I look, nothing has checked out. @RRRob knows things!

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This will be right at the end of the semester. I might have to interrupt my usual class to show the first images. It’ll be during my astronomy class on the second to last day, I think.

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I think it’s justified, under those circumstances. Did you interrupt for the first images coming back from Pluto from New Horizons? It’s going to be a very, very long time before we get any more images of Pluto and Charon that are on par with those.

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I wasn’t teaching astronomy when the New Horizons images were first released, but you can bet that I showed them to my classes and I incorporated them into my astronomy section.

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Sheer luck and too much time on my hands, really.

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Another instrument mode checked out today, this time on NIRSpec: ten to go!

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MIRI imaging was checked out today — nine modes to go!

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Another one for NIRCAM yesterday. Wide Field Slitless Spectroscopy.

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NIRISS is now fully checked out! The MIRI low resolution spectroscope may also have slipped in under the radar a couple of weeks ago (6/6/2022?), but it’s unclear. Six or seven modes to go!

Webb’s NIRSpec Acquires Multiple Targets

The Webb team has now approved 10 out of 17 science instrument modes; since last week we added (14) MIRI imaging, (2) NIRCam wide-field slitless spectroscopy, and our final NIRISS mode, (10) single-object slitless spectroscopy. As we ramp down the final commissioning activities, some openings in the schedule have appeared. The team has started to take some of the first science data, getting it ready to release starting July 12, 2022, which will mark the official end of commissioning Webb and the start of routine science operations.

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Looks like that grayed-out MIRI low resolution spectroscope checkoff was a false alarm — but not anymore! It, along with the MIRI medium resolution spectroscope was checked out today. Five modes to go!

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Webb’s NIRISS Ready to See Cosmos in Over 2,000 Infrared Colors

One of the James Webb Space Telescope’s four primary scientific instruments, known as the Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph instrument (NIRISS), has concluded its postlaunch preparations and is now ready for science.

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T-minus 14 days

ETA: There will be an online media briefing Wednesday, 6/29 at 10 AM EDT

https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive

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