Webb telescope may redefine history

24 Nov 2011, 4:50 pm   -   Source: CNN
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NASA is working on a telescope that can look back in time almost to the dawn of creation - one million miles from Earth.

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NASA is working on a telescope that could redefine our understanding of our place in the universe but it's not without an astronomical price tag.

The James Webb Telescope will be able to look further back in time than its predecessor, the Hubble telescope.

"The James Webb Telescope is to help us find our entire history, from the first things after the big bang to how the first galaxies are born," said John Mather, the telescope's senior project scientist.

Scientists are also hoping it may give them the first clues about the existence of life in another solar system.

When Webb is finally launched in 2018, years behind schedule, it will cost about $8.8 billion, $6.5 billion more than the original estimate. 

"When you're doing inventions and things for the first time, you don't know exactly what you're going to run in to and we found several things we had to work around," said Rick Howard, Webb program director.   

The Webb telescope will orbit around one million miles from Earth.
 

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Your Comments

Very Fitting

Cold day - from Townsville, 6 months ago

Very fitting if the Webb telescope may redefine history, James Webb helped redefine history with his management of NASA.

Webb orbit

Paul - from Armidale, 6 months ago

The Webb Telescope will not in fact "orbit the Earth" for more information check out Nasa Link http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/orbit.html

Why so far?

Peter - from Melbourne, 6 months ago

Gene, thats the whole point: orbiting the earth so far away so the telescope can "see" further.

it cant come soon enough! why so far...

david miller - from qld, 6 months ago

James Webb Telescope will orbit at L2 to keep the sun and earth light to one side. The L2 orbit is an elliptical orbit about the semi-stable second Lagrange point . It is one of the five solutions by the mathematician Joseph-Louis Lagrange in the 18th century to the three-body problem. Lagrange was searching for a stable configuration in which three bodies could orbit each other yet stay in the same position relative to each other. He found five such solutions, and they are called the 5 L points

Webb orbit

Paul - from Armidale, 6 months ago

The article is wrong, The Webb telescope will not "orbit" the Earth. From Nasa's website. "Webb will not actually orbit the Earth - instead it will sit at the Earth-Sun L2 Lagrange point, 1.5 million km away! Because Hubble is in Earth orbit, it was able to be launched into space by the space shuttle. Webb will be launched on an Ariane 5 rocket and because it won't be in Earth orbit, it is not designed to be serviced by the space shuttle." http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/comparison.html#orbit

one million miles from Earth

Gene - from Brisbane, 6 months ago

Imagine servicing a satellite over four times the distance of the moon! Btw, we switched to metric in Australia some time ago, at least convert the measurements before you copy and paste your story from America ;)

Webb orbit >4 times moon

Gene - from Brisbane, 6 months ago

This article says "The Webb telescope will orbit around one million miles from Earth." That's an impressive distance considering the Moon is only about 238857 miles from Earth. Is that right? Will the Webb telescope really orbit the Earth around 4.2 times the distance of the moon? Why so far I wonder?

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