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James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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LanDroid

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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Sunshield separation and tensioning is complete. Here's a 6 second sped up demo of that activity. Mirror temp is -205F on the way down to -394F. Absolute zero is -459.57F.

Now to unfurl those beautiful gold mirrors... :up:
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Chris OConnor

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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That's a bit chilly. These images are going to be amazing.
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LanDroid

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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Large primary mirror fully deployed a few minutes ago, both "wings" in place.
Mirror temp is -278F.
74% of the way to final destination.
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LanDroid

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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NASA’s Webb Reaches Alignment Milestone, Optics Working Successfully

Following the completion of critical mirror alignment steps, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope team expects that Webb’s optical performance will be able to meet or exceed the science goals the observatory was built to achieve. O n March 11, the Webb team completed the stage of alignment known as “fine phasing.” At this key stage in the commissioning of Webb’s Optical Telescope Element, every optical parameter that has been checked and tested is performing at, or above, expectations. The team also found no critical issues and no measurable contamination or blockages to Webb’s optical path. The observatory is able to successfully gather light from distant objects and deliver it to its instruments without issue.

At this stage of Webb’s mirror alignment, known as “fine phasing,” each of the primary mirror segments have been adjusted to produce one unified image of the same star using only the NIRCam instrument. This image of the star, which is called 2MASS J17554042+6551277, uses a red filter to optimize visual contrast.

Although there are months to go before Webb ultimately delivers its new view of the cosmos, achieving this milestone means the team is confident that Webb’s first-of-its-kind optical system is working as well as possible.

3/16/22
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa ... ccessfully
Obviously that is great news! However, that image of the star seems bogus to my semi-educated, but non-professional eye. :shock: I do not think the "spikes" shown in the image are natural. One can produce those spikes when photographing street lights, reflections, stars, etc. with a filter that essentially places a window screen right in front of the lense to create that phenomenon. I hope Nasa didn't doctor this image to make it look cooler.

Image
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Chris OConnor

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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I agree. The image has probably been enhanced.
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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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I don’t know whether this is the correct place to post this or even if anyone will be interested but I just been to a lecture at our local ‘University of the Third Age’. It’s for oldies.

Well, today it was ‘The History of Jodrell Bank’ which
Is here in Cheshire UK. The Lecturer was a professor who had worked at Jodrell Bank since the 1960s and he still works there but now he doesn’t get paid… :-D

Gosh, it was wonderful. He showed us Quazars, and Pulsars and how black holes happen and how immense the Milky Way is and how immenser is the Andromeda!!

We don’t matter at all folks…we are not important and with the present state of the world, I find that very comforting.

Love 💕 Pen
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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First Images From NASA’s Webb Space Telescope Coming Soon
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, a partnership with ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), will release its first full-color images and spectroscopic data on July 12, 2022.
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/20 ... oming-soon
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LanDroid

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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2 to 20 TRILLION galaxies in the observable universe??? The James Webb Space Telescope might refine those estimates.
There are more galaxies in the Universe than even Carl Sagan ever imagined
If you take the deepest image ever created of the distant Universe, the Hubble eXtreme Deep Field, and extrapolate over the whole sky, you'd estimate there were ~170 billion galaxies in the observable Universe.

...A theoretical calculation from a few years ago — the first to account for galaxies too small, faint, and distant to be seen — put the estimate far higher: at 2 trillion. But even that estimate is too low. There ought to be at least 6 trillion, and perhaps more like 20 trillion, galaxies, if we’re ever able to count them all.

...With the advent of the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, we might finally get the observational confirmation of these faint, distant, early-type galaxies that we know must be out there. The Universe, no matter how we conceive or misconceive of it, cannot hide its truths when faced with superior data.

Ethan Siegel 6/22/2022
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang ... -universe/
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LanDroid

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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Here are the first four images released from the James Webb Space Telescope. This includes the first ultra deep field image released one day early (why? because this is America!), three images released on schedule today, plus one set of spectroscopy data on exoplanet WASP-96 b, the only known gas giant with no clouds. The first video provides a sense of what JWST can see in infrared that is obscured in Hubble visible light images. The six pointed dots are nearby stars; those spikes are artifacts generated by the hexagonal mirrors.

https://www.space.com/james-webb-space- ... 1st-photos

:adore: :bow: :appl:
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Robert Tulip

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Re: James Webb telescope countdown to launch and first light

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Penelope wrote: Wed May 18, 2022 10:32 am we are not important and with the present state of the world, I find that very comforting.

Love 💕 Pen
Hi Pelelope

Humans are the universe becoming conscious of itself. That makes us the most important known existing entities, as the only location known in space and time that is able to define and construct importance. Without consciousness nothing is important.
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