![]() The NIRISS contains a highly sensitive camera that will gather information to help in the study of exoplanets. The FGS is critical to the telescope's mission, allowing it to point and focus on particular objects. There are two Canadian contributions on Webb: the Fine Guidance Sensor (FGS) and the Near-Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS). And this will allow it to peer through dust clouds that might otherwise block the light from distant objects. Webb, though, is optimized to see in the longer wavelengths of infrared, giving it much greater clarity and sensitivity. Hubble mainly sees the universe in visible or optical light, detectable by the human eye, though it can also operate in ultraviolet and near-infrared wavelengths. There's also a difference in the way in which both telescopes look at the universe. The bigger the telescope, the more light it can collect and the further back it can see.Ī look at the characteristics of the electromagnetic spectrum, which describes all the kinds of light that exists. Telescopes allow us to see further back in time by collecting faint light, which is why they're often called "light buckets" by astronomers. That means, essentially, when we look at distant stars and galaxies, we're looking back in time. The farther away an object is, the longer it takes for its light to reach us, so everything we see is as it was, not as it is. The moon's light takes just over a second to get to us, while the sun's light takes roughly eight minutes. ![]() The light of everything we see in the night sky takes time to travel to Earth. Building upon the discoveries of the famed Hubble Space Telescope, it will peer back into a time when our universe was in its infancy and will also reveal much more about the atmospheres of exoplanets.Īs of now, the telescope - also known as JWST or just Webb - is expected to launch on Dec. The $10-billion telescope is the largest and most powerful ever sent into orbit. It's been decades in the making and has faced more than its fair share of delays, but if all goes as planned, the James Webb Space Telescope will launch within the coming days.Īstronomers have been eagerly anticipating the launch of this telescope - and with good reason. ![]()
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