Kozminski Techblog

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James Webb Space Telescope is often dubbed the long awaited ‘successor’ to famous Hubble Telescope. With its recent start on 25^th of December 2021 let’s delve into the details of the telescope’s mission and elaborate on some differences between ‘Webb’ and ‘Hubble’.

Webb’s Origin and Development

The idea for a Next Generation Space Telescope was born in the 1990’s. It was planned to observe the Universe in the infra-red spectrum, which would allow to see space objects much farther or colder than Hubble could see. It was initially intended to launch in 2007, but in 2000’s it was still in early development. The first deadline was deemed impossible to meet, so the whole project was re-planned with the seven-fold expansion of the initial budget, and the launch was put-off to somewhere in the following decade. Eventually, the project’s budget exceeded $9 Billion, with European and Canadian Space Agencies contributing hundreds of millions of dollars, as well. Due to both, technical issues and factors independent of the space agencies, like the most recent Covid-19 Pandemic, the start of the mission of the Webb Telescope was scheduled for 2021. The Telescope was eventually launched from Europe’s Space Port in French Guiana on 25^th December 2021.

Differences between other space telescopes

One of the most significant differences between Webb and Hubble is the location of the mission. While Hubble is operating from Low-Earth Orbit, Webb will observe its targets from so-called ‘Earth – Sun Second Lagrange point’ (L2) which effectively means that it is few times further away from Earth than the Moon. Other very important difference is the wavelengths which telescopes utilizes. Hubble can see light varying in wavelength from ultraviolet to close infrared, while Webb can see much farther into infrared, which will be its main frequency of operation, just like Spitzer Space Telescope. Webb has also main mirror more than two times larger than Hubble’s with a diameter of 6.5 meters.

The mission

Currently the Telescope is travelling to L2, where it will make its research. After its arrival to the orbit in late January 2022, the 6 months long preparation phase will follow. When Webb is finally calibrated, it may start its observations which are meant to last at least 5 years, but the Telescope may operate for as much as 10 years. From there it will look down in infrared on countless Nebulae, Star Clusters and Systems, providing new, clearer look on already known objects. One of the first Webb’s objectives is going to be evaluating on systems with potential exoplanets discovered by Kepler Space Telescope. Another goal may be searching for stars much older than we could previously see. Due to the redshift effect, the further away the object is, the more shifted to red it will be perceived by us. JWST is able to search for much older objects than Hubble, which tend to release more radiation in the infrared frequencies, due to its greater presence in infra-red spectrum.

Conclusion

Webb’s Mission has just started, but its success is much anticipated. Its observations will verify countless theories regarding different space objects and provide many additional data which may be useful in the future. Even though, minor malfunctions may be handled by the Telescope itself, any major failure may lead to the end of the mission, because it is too far away to be repaired by a rescue team of Astronauts. Only Time will tell us what we will gain from James Webb Space Telescope…

sources:

James Webb Space Telescope – Wikipedia

Orbit – Webb/NASA

ESA – Europe’s Spaceport

Lagrange point – Wikipedia

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https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-hubble-images

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James Webb Telescope Launched On Christmas, Here Are Five Things You Need To Know As It Head To Space | Investor’s Business Daily (investors.com)

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I bet that 90% of people reading this article wished to become astronaut back in their childhood. To be honest, that was my wish too! Sadly, this article won’t be about bright future of space conquest, but rather grim reality of work in space sector.

Since beginning of space race, humanity has launched around 8100 satellites of which some 5000 remains in orbit. As you can imagine, Earth’s orbit has plenty of space and 5000 satellites should be as “big” concern as 5000 cars for a small town, so basically none. But… there are several circumstances that makes it a little bit more complex! Every artificial satellite needs to be delivered to space, which demands a big rocket that can get it into our orbit, then some parts must detach, and so on. Every step in orbit will leave new parts, and these parts will fly at speed of several thousand kilometers per second, and guess what. If you would get hit by screw at speed that high, it would be like you were hit by bolt of plasma, and same goes for every object in space.

As you may see in the picture above, this is what happens when spacecraft is hit by small debris. You might think that “come on there can’t be enough debris made by launching some satellites” and to be honest you are kind of right. Problem is that more than 95% of current object in orbit are so called zombies, serving no purpose, floating in space, waiting for impact with other body. When this happens, hundreds of small pieces burst into all directions, posing enormous threat to everything else. Sometimes government come up with “brilliant” ideas, for example Chinese government decided to test if their rockets can shoot down their own satellites – Turns out they can, however test also created enormous amount of space garbage. We could go on and on to see new examples, but let’s get to the point.

Everyday U.S. Military issues 21 warnings about space collisions. That is US alone, we can only guess that everyday there is more than one hundred warnings about space collision, so during whole year, there is at least more than 36 thousand warnings! This shows exactly how dangerous it becomes to travel into our orbit. Some specialist claims that every year we are getting closer to point of no retreat, and that means that Earth will become our jail, because we won’t be able to get safely into space.

But how can we fight with this threat you may ask? That is what you will find out in my next article!

Sources:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-quest-to-conquer-earths-space-junk-problem/

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-06170-1