A NASA launched his James Webb Space Telescope into space on December 25th of last year. In addition to the data it had already sent back to Earth, the telescope has now taken its first photograph.
The team coordinating the $10 billion telescope is “ecstatic.”
A NASA made known the world the first image captured by the James Webb Space Telescope. The photograph shows the light of a star as it was reflected by each of the golden segments of the telescope's primary mirror. Over the next month, engineers will make a set of adjustments to align all 18 hexes.
HD photograph 84406 shows a bright star in the constellation Ursa Major. In fact, in the night sky, it appears just to the right of Ursa Major. The scientists' choice was made because there are no other nearby stars that could disturb the image.
Launching Webb into space was naturally an exciting event, but for scientists and optical engineers, this is a high-profile moment.
Said Michael McElwain, project scientist for the Webb observatory at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.
In addition, he revealed that the team was “ecstatic”, as the image represents a milestone for a project that has been ongoing for several decades.
One star reflected by each segment of NASA's James Webb primary mirror
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Earth already knows space through the lens of NASA's James Webb
Having started taking the picture on February 2, NASA revealed that James Webb pointed to 156 positions over 25 hours. The infrared camera's detectors captured a total of 1,560 images that were assembled into a mosaic of about 2 billion pixels.
Taking so much data on day one required all of Webb's scientific operations and data processing systems here on Earth to run smoothly with the observatory in space from the start.
Revealed Marshall Perrin, associate scientist at James Webb and astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute.
