By Zuheir Daher
James Webb Space Telescope
The James Webb Space Telescope is a space telescope developed by NASA with contributions from the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space
Agency. The telescope is named after James E. Webb, who was the administrator of NASA from 1961 to 1968 and played an integral role in the Apollo program.
The Mission
The James Webb telescope, which is set to replace the Hubble Space Telescope, will study the origin of the
universe. Equipped with sophisticated cameras, James Webb will look at the celestial objects by capturing infrared
light from them.
By Zuheir Daher
How beneficial it is?
With the Webb, we will be able to see back in time to the earliest objects in the universe for the first time. Also
for the first time, we will be able to characterize other planets going around other stars, distant exoplanets, and see if
there are oceans, an atmosphere, what chemical elements are there.
On January 8th, The James Webb Space Telescope team reached a major mission milestone when it
finished deploying the telescope's 21-foot primary mirror. That successfully completed the final stage of
all major spacecraft deployments needed to prepare for science operations.
NASA estimates that it could take up to 120 days after launch for Webb's mirror alignment work to be
complete. Given that Webb launched on December 25, 2021 that's April 24, 2022. So Webb will likely
be pointing at stars and seeing its “first light” six weeks before that—around mid-March