Coolest Webb Page Ever
24Now with temperature data!
https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/whereIsWebb.html?units=english
/image Webb Space Telescope
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Now with temperature data!
https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/webbLaunch/whereIsWebb.html?units=english
/image Webb Space Telescope
/image hot side hot cold side cold
As of 2022-01-02 14:14 CDT
https://www.lightyear.fm/.
That’s an amazing space place too!
Love the explanation of the L2 orbit - didn’t quite understand it before until I saw the animation here:
https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/about/orbit.html
Fully deployed!
Mirrors are deploying!
They have 3mm to go and then the focusing adjustments begin.
We’re home! Welcome to L2!
Brr! It’s cold! Like 50° above absolute zero cold!
Let us now deploy the (in this instance, well-earmed and justifiable) term
AWESOME.
/giphy awesome space
PANS! GLANDS! CRAYONS! AWESOME!
Most Recently Completed:
WEBB IS ORBITING L2
Next Steps: Cooldown, Alignment, Calibration
Nominal Event Time: Launch + 30 days
Status: Webb is in L2 Orbit and Cooling
Telescope deployment is complete. Webb is now orbiting L2. Ongoing cooldown and eventual instrument turn-on, testing and calibration occur. Telescope mirror alignment and calibration also begin as temperatures fall within range and instruments are enabled.
Stay tuned…this page will track these milestones and keep you informed of where Webb is on the path to our first science images.
The telescope and scientific instruments started to cool rapidly in the shade of the sunshield once it was deployed, but it will take several weeks for them to cool all the way down to stable operational temperatures. This cooldown will be carefully controlled with strategically-placed electric heater strips. The remaining five months of commissioning will be all about aligning the optics and calibrating the scientific instruments.
The 3D viewer is cool!
Like 53° Kelvin cool!
FIRST LIGHT!
Really!
FIRST LIGHT !!!
https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/02/11/photons-received-webb-sees-its-first-star-18-times/
Here is a labeled version for which mirrors are which.
Go Science!
This image is actually a small section of the whole image because they didn’t know where the mirrors would end up, so they had to cast a wide net to start with and make sure they got that target star in Ursa Major (the constellation with the Big Dipper).
@compunaut @kyeh
Unlike the Titanic, this ship got there.
@mike808 That’s pretty fabulous!
Things are moving along.
The image mosaic (above the lego set), shows 18 randomly positioned copies of the same star, served as the starting point for the alignment process.
To complete the first stage of alignment, the team moved the primary mirror segments to arrange the dots of starlight into a hexagonal image array.
Each dot of starlight is labeled with the corresponding mirror segment that captured it.
Credits: NASA (top); NASA/STScI/J. DePasquale (bottom)
Purty pictures.
It’s full of stars…
The oblong thingys are galaxies. Post processing by JJ Abrams for added lens flare.
Here’s the simulation overview of what’s going on.
Chillin’ with Webb
Current State/Step : Final Cooling - MIRI
Precedes Mirror Alignment Step 7
It’s full of stars!
https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2022/04/28/nasas-webb-in-full-focus-ready-for-instrument-commissioning/
Alignment of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is now complete. After full review, the observatory has been confirmed to be capable of capturing crisp, well-focused images with each of its four powerful onboard science instruments. Upon completing the seventh and final stage of telescope alignment, the team held a set of key decision meetings and unanimously agreed that Webb is ready to move forward into its next and final series of preparations, known as science instrument commissioning. This process will take about two months before scientific operations begin in the summer.
Just how awesome is JWST?
More infrared astronomy-pr0n:
From here at universetoday.com.
Here’s an animated GIF overlaying the two images to really show how much better the images we will get from JWST.
In this comparison animated gif, we see Spitzer’s and JWST’s view of a part of the Large Magellanic Cloud, the largest companion galaxy that orbits our own, the Milky Way. Spitzer’s Infrared Array Camera, which observes light with a wavelength of 8 microns, identifies the stars and the interstellar gas in the nearby galaxy.
But JWST’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), sees the same with unprecedented clarity. The emission of “polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons,” important molecules in interstellar space, is seen clearly with all their strands and nebulosity. This is the difference between Spitzer’s 0.85-meters (2.8 feet) primary mirror and JWST’s whopping 6.5-meter (21 feet) one.
While the space telescope continues to be tested, NASA officials confirmed yesterday that the first scientific images are expected to be delivered in mid-July, though it’s still hush hush what the target will be.
(Source)
NASA’s Webb Delivers Deepest Infrared Image of Universe Yet
https://www.nasa.gov/webbfirstimages
This first image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is the deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date. Known as Webb’s First Deep Field, this image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 is overflowing with detail. Thousands of galaxies – including the faintest objects ever observed in the infrared – have appeared in Webb’s view for the first time. This slice of the vast universe covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length.
https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2022/nasa-s-webb-delivers-deepest-infrared-image-of-universe-yet
https://webbtelescope.org/news/first-images
Full Res, 4537x6162, PNG (28MB)
This is 1472 X 2000, PNG (2.85 MB)
@mike808 It really is beautiful!
Here is a comparison netween Hubble and Webb.
Simply amazing and awesome!
Hubble:
Webb:
@mike808 Even cooler that JWST did this in about 12.5 hours whereas Hubble took weeks.
@ExtraMedium @mike808 Been super-excited about this. I wonder how much deeper they can go now!
@ExtraMedium @PHRoG
The Hubble image had a 2 week exposure time.
The Webb image took just 12.5 hours.
@ExtraMedium @mike808 yup! Huuuge, diference.
I’d assume, just like the Hubble, they could do a longer exposure to see even further?
Also read it’s already got smacked by a few micrometeorites.
assume everyone is watching the live broadcast right now. crazy fucking excited about seeing these next images.
Now that the first images are published…
Here’s more comparison shots.
It’s like when we were comparing the Hubble images to the best earth-based telescopes. On steroids.
The Carina Nebula:
Another Hubble Webb overlay:
To all the haters from the JWST team:
