![]() ![]() He said Webb will open up “new territory that you’ll never be able to tackle from the ground.” Technicians lift the mirror of the James Webb Space Telescope using a crane at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. ![]() ![]() The atmosphere won’t get in the way of the telescope’s imaging capabilities because it won’t be on Earth.ĭata from the Webb telescope can be combined with information from other Earth-based telescopes to compensate for the infrared advantage that Mauna Kea has over La Palma, Mather said. Mather, the senior project scientist for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, planned for launch into space in 2021, said the new instrument will be extremely effective at gathering infrared light. To see distant planets near bright stars, astronomers use telescopes to capture infrared light that emanates from the space objects.īut John Mather, an astrophysicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2006 for his work on the Big Bang theory, says there are other ways to get that data. The advanced optics and huge size of the Thirty Meter Telescope, especially if built at Mauna Kea’s higher altitude, could allow scientists to more easily detect potentially life-filled planets, Bolte said. “The star is so much brighter than the planet you’re trying to observe, it’s really hard to do.” “Let’s suppose one of your big science cases is to look for life on planets that are orbiting other stars,” he said. The Gran Telescopio Canarias at the Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos on the Canary Island of La Palma, Spain. “When the air is super stable above the site, you get images that you simply couldn’t get anyplace else.”īolte, who has used existing Mauna Kea telescopes, said those “magic” Hawaii nights could hold discoveries that might be missed in La Palma. “Every once in a while at Mauna Kea, you get one of those magic nights,” said University of California, Santa Cruz astronomy and astrophysics professor Michael Bolte, a Thirty Meter Telescope board member. There’s also no significant opposition to putting the telescope on La Palma like there is in Hawaii, where some Native Hawaiians consider the mountain sacred and have blocked trucks from hauling construction equipment to Mauna Kea’s summit for more than a month.īut Hawaii has advantages that scientists say make it slightly better: higher altitude, cooler temperatures and rare star-gazing moments that will allow the cutting-edge telescope to reach its full potential. Thirty Meter Telescope officials acknowledge that their backup site atop a peak on the Spanish Canary island of La Palma is a comparable observatory location and that it wouldn’t cost more money or take extra time to build it there. HONOLULU - When starlight from billions of years ago zips across the universe and finally comes into focus on Earth, astronomers want their telescopes to be in the best locations possible to see what’s out there.ĭespite years of legal battles and months of protests by Native Hawaiian opponents, the international coalition that wants to build the world’s largest telescope in Hawaii insists that the islands’ highest peak - Mauna Kea - is the best place for their $1.4 billion instrument. The April 2023 full pink moon is here - and could be why you can't sleep 'Incredible' meteoroid fireball blazes across night skyĪlien life is most likely to exist in these star systems: scientistsĥ fast radio bursts of unknown origin 'skewer' neighboring galaxy ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |