For the ambitious James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the moment of truth succeeded on Saturday, as shown on NASA TV: the full extension of the main mirror.
It was fully deployed at 4.28 pm Belgian time, when the telescope was 1,069,000 km away from us. The main mirror has a diameter of 6.5 meters and was launched when folded.
In the coming days, the JWST team will be tweaking the setup of each of the 18 individual mirror segments. They are each controlled by seven actuators.
The whole unfolding process had never been performed in space before. The telescope is now fully configured to be up and running in just over five months. That will happen from the L2 point where the viewer has to arrive at 1.5 million of us within two weeks. The JWST will then perform a third and final course correction to get into the correct orbit.
The US-European-Canadian binoculars costing nearly $10 billion should be able to peer in the infrared until 200 million years after the Big Bang and thus capture the light of the first stars and galaxies.
The launch with a European Ariane launcher happened on Christmas Day.
The Center Spatial de Liège and KU Leuven were also involved in the development.
It was fully deployed at 4.28 pm Belgian time, when the telescope was 1,069,000 km away from us. The main mirror has a diameter of 6.5 meters and was launched when folded. In the coming days, the JWST team will be tweaking the setup of each of the 18 individual mirror segments. They are each controlled by seven actuators. The whole unfolding process had never been performed in space before. The telescope is now fully configured to be up and running in just over five months. That will happen from the L2 point where the viewer has to arrive at 1.5 million of us within two weeks. The JWST will then perform a third and final course correction to get into the correct orbit. The US-European-Canadian binoculars costing nearly $10 billion should be able to peer in the infrared until 200 million years after the Big Bang and thus capture the light of the first stars and galaxies. The launch with a European Ariane launcher happened on Christmas Day. The Center Spatial de Liège and KU Leuven were also involved in the development.
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