Saturday, January 1, 2022

James Webb; looking into the Genesis of our Universe

 

The James Webb telescope is on its month-long journey to Lagrange point L2 after its successful launch on December 25, 2021.  Point L2 is almost 1 million miles away from the Earth.


The Webb will look beyond to what the Hubble has already looked at.  As more distant objects are more redshifted and their light is in the near-infrared their observation requires an infrared telescope this is why the Webb was designed for.


The Webb will be able to look at the first galaxies and the first stars after the Big Bang, at the Genesis of our Universe .


View of the Andromeda galaxy taken by the Herschel Space Observatory an infrared telescope built by the European Space Agency.  The primary difference between the Webb and Herschel is their wavelength range and also the diameter of Webb's mirror is 6.5 meters and the Herschel's 3.5 meters.  The Hubble, the Webb and the Herschel will provide information that will allow astronomers to look and understand the early phases of our Universe.


The James Webb on Jan 24, 2022 reached its orbit 1 million miles from Earth and will begin looking back to the time the first starts and galaxies were forming 13.7 billion years ago and provide information about the origin of our Universe. 

                                     Credit to all images is due to NASA and ESA.

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