On Saturday 25.12. watched the entire scientific world with bated breath the launch of the James Webb Telescope. Shortly after noon of our time, the Ariane 5 rocket launched a new observatory from French Guiana, which will allow humanity to look deep into the past of the Universe. The $ 10 billion project is running smoothly so far, but the critical days of the entire mission are coming right now.
Webb’s space telescope is an unprecedented achievement in the history of astronomy. Thanks to infrared observations, the telescope should look back 13.5 billion years, its goal is to explore the very beginning of the Universe, to expand knowledge about the evolution and formation of the first galaxies after the Big Bang, the search for exoplanets and life outside the solar system. The project has been in preparation for 25 long years and during this time an estimated ten thousand scientists, engineers and technicians from 20 countries, including the Czech Republic, have worked on it.
The launch of the Ariane 5 rocket took less than half an hour, after which the telescope separated from the carrier and began a journey to its destination, which will take a total of 29 days. The destination of the path is the liberation center L2, also called the second Lagrange point. It is a place 1.5 million km from the Earth, where the gravitational forces of the Earth and the Sun are in balance. The telescope will be able to maintain a stable orbit here and at the same time be constantly in the shadow of the Earth.
Sleepless nights for scientists
The telescope has already successfully developed the solar panel, which took place an hour after launch, and thanks to which the telescope now has its own source of electricity. The track was modified using the first of three planned engine ignitions. One day after launch (T + 1), the structure was successfully deployed with antennas that now allow data transmission between the telescope and Earth. This was also the last automatic step. All other sequences from a total of 344 planned steps will already be controlled by commands from the control center, carefully monitored and, if necessary (within very limited possibilities) corrected. Overall, this is the most complex decomposition, activation and calibration, that NASA has ever performed in space.
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On current days (ie T + 3 to T + 8 from the start), sleepless nights begin for scientists. It’s time to develop a heat shield, which is one of the most critical moments of the mission. The James Webb Telescope is designed to operate at -223 degrees Celsius, and without a sun visor, its functionality is not possible. Gradually, the side wings will tilt, then the sun visor will unfold to the sides, the five membranes will separate from each other and finally the sun visor will be stretched. The membranes are made of kapton and are coated with a thin layer of aluminum. They are approximately 22 times 10 meters in size, and when they are fully developed, the telescope begins to cool to operating temperature.
Because the telescope will be far from Earth, it will not be possible to send manned service missions to it, unlike the Hubble Telescope. All steps must be carried out without any problems. Interestingly, however, scientists have some backup solutions even in the event that an electric motor or spiral gets stuck; for example, they have the original opportunity to physically shake the entire telescope. Furthermore, they can rotate with it arbitrarily and thus heat its various sides and cool others as required.
Will it answer the key questions of the universe?
If the operation with the heat shield takes place without complications, in the following days (between the tenth and thirteenth day after the start) another critical moment will follow, namely the layout of the primary and secondary mirrors. First, the tripod with the secondary mirror is tilted. The primary mirror will follow, ie the very heart of the whole telescope. Its diameter is 6.5 meters and consists of a total of 18 hexagonal mirrors made of light beryllium, coated with gold and a thin layer of anti-scratch silicon. The primary mirror is now composed of three parts, the central and two wings, which must be tilted on the thirteenth day after takeoff.
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If everything goes according to plan, then thirteen days after the launch, the main parts of the telescope will be dismantled and it will be waiting for another two weeks of travel to point L2. In the meantime, the telescope will continue to cool down, and the other devices will gradually be activated. The whole complex weighs 6.5 tons and contains many complex technological units. In addition to optical systems and scientific instruments, there are other subsystems, such as position control, communication with the control center, power management system, or self-propelled in the form of nozzles and rocket motors.
One month after launch, the last of the three engine ignitions takes place, anchoring the telescope at its final position at point L2. Over the next four months, the telescope will continue to cool to the target -223 degrees and all instruments will be activated, tested and calibrated. It was not until about half a year after launch, in June 2022, that the Webb Telescope should begin delivering the first scientific measurements and images to Earth. And by all means, we have something to look forward to, this new state-of-the-art observatory should help answer key questions about the origins of our Universe.
Here you can follow the path of a unique telescope.
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