The James Webb Space Telescope and other cool astronomy stuff!

And they gave NASA a blank check for all intents and purposes to make it happen, and damn the expense. They were not going to let the Soviet Union be the first to land a man in the Moon!

The fact that we got better intercontinental ballistic missiles and spy satellites out of it was purely coincidental, I’m sure.

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To say nothing of the fracturing of efforts into Space Force (DOD). And maybe the WFIRST/Nancy Grace Roman that was the gift (???) from the intelligence services that found they already had enough capability and had no use for the Hubble-quality telescope body, but why not wait a decade or two or so to decide that we do need more telescopes in orbit. Ad infinitum

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That’s nothing new. The Air Force had its own little space program in the sixties and early seventies (Dyna-Soar, Manned Orbital Laboratory, etc.).

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Another for NIRSpec.

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It’s actually one of two. There apparently has been some thought of sending the other one to survey Mars in more detail. No Earth observation, though; a condition of the donation was that NASA was prohibited to point either of these telescopes at Earth.

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Interesting. I remember when that NRO donation happened, but had completely forgotten about them.

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MIRI is complete. Two to go.

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Another Webb Telescope Instrument Gets the “Go for Science”

Jun 30, 2022 at 12:26 PM

The second of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s four primary scientific instruments, known as the Mid-Infrared instrument (MIRI), has concluded its postlaunch preparations and is now ready for science.

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Science!

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NIRSpec’s multi-object spectroscope passed today, completing NIRSpec’s checkout!

One. Mode. To. Go!

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image

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Some handy links and info in this post from July 1:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/07/01/how-to-see-webbs-first-images/

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Just a little stats candy while we wait for another week: Apparently NASA released a tease or two for astronomers of the spectrographic resolution of MIRI. In the chart below, they targeted a single galaxy (for its hydrogen spike) during calibration. This chart reportedly shows it approximately compared to the previous best. Huge boost (# of points).

WebbMiri-H-spectroRes

This comes via a YouTube video from astrophysicist Dr. Becky Smethurst’s channel, which contains more explanations at around 4m13s.

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Tiny little sneak peek, anyone?

https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/07/06/webbs-fine-guidance-sensor-provides-a-preview/

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Webb: The World Is About To Be New Again

As the Webb team wraps up the final tests for commissioning this week, we are now only days away from the public release of the first images and spectra on July 12! This also means that Webb is moving into the phase of full science operations that includes a highly impressive suite of science programsfrom the solar system to the distant universe. The entire Webb team is ready to celebrate the long journey to this point and embark on the next few decades of groundbreaking infrared astronomy.

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NASA’s Webb Telescope NIRSpec Instrument Ready for Science

Jul 7, 2022 at 2:46 PM

Three of the four science instruments on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have completed their commissioning activities and are ready for science.

Each of Webb’s instruments has multiple modes of operation, which need to be tested, calibrated, and ultimately verified before they can begin to conduct science. The latest instrument to complete this process, the Near-Infrared Spectrograph, or NIRSpec, has four key modes the team officially confirmed as ready to go.

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I wish Discourse would let me embed it, but this will have to do:

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NEW: NASA Shares List of Cosmic Targets for Webb Telescope’s First Images

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2022/nasa-shares-list-of-cosmic-targets-for-webb-telescope-s-first-images

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I was going to post this one! But I didn’t have time yesterday. Shucks. :slight_smile: So exciting!

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