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Speaker 1: Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.

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Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,

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Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Radio and

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Speaker 1: I love all things tech and the long time listeners

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Speaker 1: of this show know that I'm really interested in space

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Speaker 1: and the technology we use to expand our understanding of

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Speaker 1: the cosmos. As I record this, I am actually reading

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Speaker 1: up on how the NASA Perseverance Rover has deposited the

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Speaker 1: Ingenuity copter on the service of Mars, which is super exciting.

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Speaker 1: But I'll have to do a follow up episode about

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Speaker 1: the Perseverance and Ingenuity later on after more has actually happened.

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Speaker 1: So let's get back to what I'm talking about today. Also,

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Speaker 1: longtime listeners will know that I like to point out

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Speaker 1: that space is always always trying to kill you, from

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Speaker 1: the lack of oxygen to the proliferation of radiation that

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Speaker 1: could really mess us up, to the long term effects

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Speaker 1: of micro gravity. Spaces not where you want to spend

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Speaker 1: any appreciable amount of time. There's just no atmosphere, you

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Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. But dad jokes aside, I do

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Speaker 1: really love learning about space, and moreover, learning about the

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Speaker 1: tech we use to pursue that learning. To that end,

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Speaker 1: I thought I would do an episode about the James

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Speaker 1: Webs Space Telescope. And you know, I'm I'm really interested

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Speaker 1: in this telescope because I actually have a tattoo that's

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Speaker 1: part of NASA history connected to this telescope. I even

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Speaker 1: got that whole thing shot on video while I was

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Speaker 1: getting the tattoo. But I'll talk about that a little

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Speaker 1: bit more towards the end of the episode. So let's

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Speaker 1: get into this now. I'm not going to dive into

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Speaker 1: all the instruments and all the technology behind the James Webb.

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Speaker 1: Maybe I'll do a second episode where I go into

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Speaker 1: that more detail because it is incredibly technical. Um it's

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Speaker 1: it's phenomenal the technology that's going into place to make

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Speaker 1: this thing work. But I really wanted to give more

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Speaker 1: of a high level look at what the James Webb

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Speaker 1: Space Telescope is and what it is supposed to do.

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Speaker 1: So first things first, who was James Webb? Well, James E.

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Speaker 1: Webb was the second person appointed as head of NASA.

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Speaker 1: He served in that position from February nineteen sixty one

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Speaker 1: until October nineteen That meant he led NASA during the

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Speaker 1: crucial years that saw the agency launched the first American

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Speaker 1: into orbit, that would be Alan Shepard in May nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixty one to just before the launch of Apollo seven,

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Speaker 1: which was the first Apollo mission to send an entire

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Speaker 1: crew into orbit. The manned missions that NASA was pursuing

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Speaker 1: understandably received a ton of attention and coverage, but Webb's

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Speaker 1: goal was to balance the narrative of sending astronauts to orbit,

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Speaker 1: you know, the human achievement of going into space and

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Speaker 1: and later on going to the Moon. He wanted to

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Speaker 1: balance that with the need to actually use those missions

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Speaker 1: to help expand our understanding of science. He felt that

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Speaker 1: he needed to make certain that there were always scientific

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Speaker 1: elements to those missions in order to link the space

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Speaker 1: race to gaining knowledge, to expanding our understanding of the universe. Otherwise,

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Speaker 1: sending people out into space could potentially get reductive. It

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Speaker 1: could end up being a political statement because really the

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Speaker 1: United States was locking horns with the then Soviet Union

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Speaker 1: in the space race. So he wanted to make sure

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Speaker 1: that we were building a foundation to learn more, not

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Speaker 1: just to you know, show off. And I don't mean

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Speaker 1: to reduce the achievements of the men and women who

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Speaker 1: worked in the space industry at the time. Rather, this

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Speaker 1: is all about perception and the political part of trying

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Speaker 1: to get space programs together. The science is pretty darn

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Speaker 1: cool no matter how you look at it. Well, anyway,

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Speaker 1: Web himself wasn't a scientist, but his work really helped

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Speaker 1: shape NASA and allowed the organization to benefit from the

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Speaker 1: support that he was able to get politically in order

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Speaker 1: to conduct scientific experiments that we otherwise would not be

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Speaker 1: able to do. Web was also able to form and

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Speaker 1: leverage political relationships to make sure that the scientists and

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Speaker 1: engineers back at NASA could realize their ambitions and goals.

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Speaker 1: In fact, he was an expert at creating and maintaining

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Speaker 1: those relationships like that was that was his forte and

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Speaker 1: that's why NASA chose his name for the space Telescope.

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Speaker 1: All right, So let's get back to that story now. Currently,

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Speaker 1: the plan is to launch this spacecraft in October of

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Speaker 1: this year, this year being twenty one in case you

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Speaker 1: are listening to this at some point in the future

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Speaker 1: and you're just going through the back catalog of tech

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Speaker 1: Stuff episodes. Now, that is after several delays and hiccups

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Speaker 1: that have pushed back this project that has had about

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Speaker 1: a thirty year history, in fact longer if you want

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Speaker 1: to be a little lucy goosey with definitions of history.

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Speaker 1: And by that, I mean you could argue that the

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Speaker 1: James Webb Space Telescope began its journey all the way

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Speaker 1: back in September nine nine. That was before its predecessor,

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Speaker 1: the Hubble Space Telescope, had even launched. The Hubble would

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Speaker 1: go up in but scientists were already talking about the

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Speaker 1: next step what would come after the Hubble. And this

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Speaker 1: is one of the really cool things about science and technology.

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Speaker 1: It's not enough to tackle really big challenges and then

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Speaker 1: get them off the ground, so speak, you already need

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Speaker 1: to be thinking ahead about what is going to come next,

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Speaker 1: which sounds pretty exhausting to me, but really cool all

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Speaker 1: the same. Also, I can kind of identify because I

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Speaker 1: can't really reflect on the show I'm recording. I gotta

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Speaker 1: already be thinking about the next show now. Granted that's

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Speaker 1: orders of magnitude less complicated than I don't know, sending

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Speaker 1: stuff into space anyway. In September, n NASA co hosted

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Speaker 1: a workshop that focused pun intended on the next generations

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Speaker 1: space telescope, and the other co host was the Space

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Speaker 1: Telescope Science Institute or st S little c I. More

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Speaker 1: than one experts in the fields of astronomy and engineering

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Speaker 1: gathered to to start the process of outlining what the

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Speaker 1: next generation of space telescopes should be able to do,

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Speaker 1: How would we be able to make it do those things,

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Speaker 1: where would we need to actually position the telescope in

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Speaker 1: order to do it, and so on. Initially, the group

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Speaker 1: considered the possibility of designing a near infrared telescope that

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Speaker 1: would call the Moon home, or perhaps a very high

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Speaker 1: Earth orbit. As it would turn out, we would go

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Speaker 1: to a very specific high Earth orbit. Actually it's not

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Speaker 1: really so much an Earth orbit, high solar orbit. Now,

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Speaker 1: these discussions weren't resolved in a weekend or anything like that. Rather,

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Speaker 1: they carried on for years as the experts debated the

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Speaker 1: best course of action that would in theory, return the

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Speaker 1: best results assuming mission success, of course, which is never

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Speaker 1: a guarantee when we're talking about launching stuff into space.

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Speaker 1: If you look at the list of attempted space missions

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Speaker 1: over the course of our relatively brief space history, you

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Speaker 1: know there's like a fift success rate depending on which

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Speaker 1: versions you're looking at, so it is not a sure thing.

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Speaker 1: A committee with formal recommendations wouldn't present their conclusions until

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Speaker 1: seven years after those initial meetings, and I think that

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Speaker 1: really helps illustrate that we're talking about really complicated technologies

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Speaker 1: and missions here, and that that seven year span from

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Speaker 1: initial ideation to recommendation is a great guide on how

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Speaker 1: the project has slowly taken shape sense slowly but methodically,

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Speaker 1: Like it has to be methodical because we're talking about

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Speaker 1: plans where once we launch it, there's not a whole

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Speaker 1: lot of opportunity to fix things if they go wrong.

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Speaker 1: But in the meantime, while discussions were ongoing as to

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Speaker 1: what type of telescope would follow the Hubble, we got

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Speaker 1: the Hubble, while the James Web Space Telescope first began

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Speaker 1: to take shape during conversations that started in nine The

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Speaker 1: Hubble's conception dates all the way back to the nineties.

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Speaker 1: Before we called it the Hubble, it had a different

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Speaker 1: and rather mundane name. We called it the Large Space Telescope,

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Speaker 1: which is descriptive at least. But why would we bother

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Speaker 1: with a space telescope in the first place, Well, here

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Speaker 1: on Earth We've got lots of telescopes. Some of them

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Speaker 1: are purely optical telescopes using lenses. They are all about

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Speaker 1: capturing and bending light so that we can actually look

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Speaker 1: at stuff that's really far away. We also have some

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Speaker 1: that are radio telescopes. These are giant dishes that pick

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Speaker 1: up faint radio signals, which then we process and interpret

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Speaker 1: to determine what might have made those radio waves way

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Speaker 1: on space, stuff like stars, quasars, galaxies, that kind of thing,

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Speaker 1: not necessarily, you know, aliens, not necessarily like artificially created

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Speaker 1: radio signals. Typically we're talking about actual celestial bodies that

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Speaker 1: generate radio waves. But these types of telescopes have a barrier,

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Speaker 1: and that barrier is Earth's atmosphere. While we depend upon

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Speaker 1: that atmosphere because you know, without it we would die,

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Speaker 1: the atmosphere also absorbs, reflects and otherwise blocks some stuff

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Speaker 1: from getting through. This isn't all bad, mind you. Our

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Speaker 1: atmosphere is part of the protective layer we have that

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Speaker 1: keeps us from being bombarded with cosmic radiation. But it

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Speaker 1: does mean that if you're making observations of deep space

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Speaker 1: and you're fighting against those layers of atmosphere in order

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Speaker 1: to do it, and you're going to run up against

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Speaker 1: some fundamental limitations of how sharp an image you can produce.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's all these things just happen, right. We

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Speaker 1: we've it's like having a foggy lens. You you're not

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Speaker 1: able to see as far away. You're not able to

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Speaker 1: see as clearly because we've got this atmosphere that's blurring

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Speaker 1: the image. Putting a telescope out into space gets around

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Speaker 1: that problem, right, I mean, the telescope can be outside

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Speaker 1: the atmosphere and we get a clear view of the

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Speaker 1: depths of space. A space telescope with the proper sensors

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Speaker 1: can examine wavelengths of the electro magnetic spectrum that wouldn't

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Speaker 1: be able to penetrate the air's atmosphere very effectively. I

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Speaker 1: should also mention that the Hubble was not the first

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Speaker 1: space telescope, but it did mark the most ambitious space

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Speaker 1: telescope project at that time and for many decades. While

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Speaker 1: the paper in nineteen six was the first to propose

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Speaker 1: putting a telescope in orbit, years before anyone had managed

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Speaker 1: to even launch the simplest of satellites, the first working

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Speaker 1: group to concentrate on this challenge didn't really happen until

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four. The US Congress approved the project in

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven, and the following year engineers began to

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Speaker 1: build the primary mirror for the telescope. The purpose of

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Speaker 1: the telescope's mirror is to focus incoming light from far

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Speaker 1: distant astronomical objects onto really a secondary mirror which then

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Speaker 1: reflects that light into sensors. And now it's time to

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Speaker 1: learn about optics. And I'm not using optics in that

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Speaker 1: corporate speak way of this is gonna look bad for us,

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Speaker 1: and our shareholders are going to be angry. I'm using

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Speaker 1: optics the proper way. Gosh darn ittt, I hate corporate speak,

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Speaker 1: all right. So, a refracting telescope is one that uses

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Speaker 1: lenses made out of curved glass to collect and focus

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Speaker 1: LIE eight so that we can get a good look

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Speaker 1: at distant objects. A simple refracting telescope would have two lenses.

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Speaker 1: You've got one which is the at the large end

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Speaker 1: of the telescope. This is the end that's pointing up

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Speaker 1: towards the sky. That lens gathers light and it bends

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Speaker 1: that light, the incoming light, into a pathway that converges

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Speaker 1: on a point that's inside the telescope, and rather than

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Speaker 1: the light just traveling straight down the tube of the telescope,

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Speaker 1: if there were no lens there would just go straight instead,

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Speaker 1: it all gets focused onto that single focal point. At

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Speaker 1: the other end of the telescope is a eye piece,

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Speaker 1: a second piece of curved glass much smaller in size,

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Speaker 1: and it acts like a magnifying lens with a focal

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Speaker 1: point that hits that same spot inside the telescope. This

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Speaker 1: lens effectively unbends the light so that we can see

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Speaker 1: a representation of what is out there in space as

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Speaker 1: if that stuff were much much closer to us. For

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Speaker 1: this to work, the lenses have to be very smooth,

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Speaker 1: they have to be curved precisely, and they have to

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Speaker 1: be the right distance apart from one another, otherwise the

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Speaker 1: image won't be clear. Focusing a telescope is a matter

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Speaker 1: of making very fine adjustments in the distance between the

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Speaker 1: eye piece and the other lens so that those focal

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Speaker 1: points line up properly. And lenses work okay, but they

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Speaker 1: have some pretty major drawbacks. One is that they get

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Speaker 1: pretty heavy, especially the bigger they are. It's hard to

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Speaker 1: make thin curved glass that can serve as a lens,

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Speaker 1: and so as lenses get larger, they get thicker, and

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Speaker 1: they get heavier and heavy is not a great feature

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Speaker 1: when you're talking about shooting stuff up into space where

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Speaker 1: every pound or kilogram really counts. You also can't, you know,

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Speaker 1: collapse it. You can't make it go into a smaller

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Speaker 1: form without crushing the glass and turning it into silica.

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Speaker 1: So that's not not a great great solution. However, we

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Speaker 1: can make really thin mirrors curve to mirrors, and mirrors

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Speaker 1: bend light as well, though now you're talking about reflecting

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Speaker 1: light rather than refracting light. So a typical reflecting telescope

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Speaker 1: looks kind of like a cylindrical drum that has an

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Speaker 1: eye piece near the top end of it, and at

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Speaker 1: the base of the cylinder is a curved mirror that

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Speaker 1: collects light that's coming into the telescope. It reflects that

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Speaker 1: light up to a smaller mirror closer to the top

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Speaker 1: reflect that light toward an eyepiece which you look into

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Speaker 1: um and that may still have a magnifying lens part

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Speaker 1: attached to it. This approach does mean, however, that that

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Speaker 1: secondary mirror can block a little bit of the incoming light,

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Speaker 1: so the image can be a little dim Depending upon

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Speaker 1: the design of the reflecting telescope, mirrors can weigh way

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Speaker 1: less than lenses. You just need a very reflective surface,

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Speaker 1: and so they are ideal for the purpose says of

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Speaker 1: a space telescope. Using curved mirrors around a detector allows

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Speaker 1: the telescope to collect and then direct light that can

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Speaker 1: then be captured by whatever that detector is, which is

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Speaker 1: effectively acting like the eye piece lens. It's it's typically

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Speaker 1: like a camera or some other sensor. The Hubble's primary

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Speaker 1: mirror measured two point four meters across or seven point

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Speaker 1: nine feet. The company making the mirror was the Perkin

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Speaker 1: Elmer Corporation, and it took years to make this mirror.

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Speaker 1: The cameras aboard the Hubble would be able to take

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Speaker 1: images in the visible, infrared, and ultra violet bands of light,

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Speaker 1: but primarily was focused on again pun intended the visible spectrum.

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Speaker 1: In n three, the Large Space Telescope officially became the

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Speaker 1: Hubble Space Telescope, honoring Edwin Hubble, this astronomer who had

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Speaker 1: passed away in nineteen fifty three had proven that what

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Speaker 1: we once believed to be merely clouds of gas and

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Speaker 1: dust out there in space were in fact other galaxies,

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Speaker 1: and that they were moving away from our galaxy. So

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Speaker 1: naming the telescope after him was a fitting tribute. Work

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Speaker 1: continued on the Hubble tragedy would delay the planned launch

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Speaker 1: of the space Telescope WIN. On January ninety six, the

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Speaker 1: Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart a little more than a

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Speaker 1: minute after it had launched, losing all hands aboard. NASA

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Speaker 1: suspended the Space Shuttle program for more than a year

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Speaker 1: in order to investigate the cause of the disaster and

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Speaker 1: to take measures to prevent it from happening again. And

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Speaker 1: since the Hubble was to be lifted into space inside

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Speaker 1: a Space Shuttle, ad meant that its own launch would

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Speaker 1: have to be pushed back. Hubble would launch in nineteen,

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Speaker 1: as I mentioned earlier, a year after scientists were already

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Speaker 1: talking about the next space telescope. A few months after deployment,

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Speaker 1: scientists discovered that the Hubble's mirror had a slight imperfection

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Speaker 1: in the heurvature. And by slight, i'm talking about an

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Speaker 1: error that measured just to microns, and a micron is

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Speaker 1: point zero zero one millimeters, So we're talking about an

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Speaker 1: error that would be imperceptible to humans without the aid

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Speaker 1: of special instruments to measure it. When we come back,

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Speaker 1: I'll talk briefly about the mission that's set out to

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Speaker 1: adjust for this error, and then we'll move on to

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Speaker 1: the James Web Space Telescope. But first, let's take a

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Speaker 1: quick break. All right, let's get back to that mistake

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Speaker 1: in the Hubble. So that tiny mirror curvature error meant

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Speaker 1: that the Hubble was unable to achieve the level of

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Speaker 1: focus that scientists were hoping for. It could still take pictures,

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Speaker 1: it's just they weren't quite as sharp as they were

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Speaker 1: supposed to be. So it worked just not as well

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Speaker 1: as anticipated. The scientists and engineers who designed the Hubble

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Speaker 1: had always intended it to be a technology that could

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Speaker 1: be upgraded by sending astronauts up there to make adjustments.

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Speaker 1: I mean, the Hubble was and still is in Earth orbit.

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Speaker 1: It's it was accessible for Space Shuttle missions, so that

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Speaker 1: was always part of the plan, and so some of

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Speaker 1: the early work in that regard of upgrades really revolved

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Speaker 1: around finding ways to work around this tiny error in

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Speaker 1: the mirror's curvature. The first mission to really address this

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Speaker 1: happened in late nine when astronauts installed two new instruments

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Speaker 1: that can actually accept light from this imperfect mirror, and

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Speaker 1: the kind of a post processing approach correct for that error. So,

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Speaker 1: in other words, they didn't fix the mirror because that

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Speaker 1: would have been incredibly difficult. I'm not even sure how

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Speaker 1: they would have managed it. So instead they installed sensors

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Speaker 1: or cameras with systems that could correct for that imperfect action,

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Speaker 1: which was a pretty neat approach. The Hubble played a

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Speaker 1: central role in expanding our understanding of the universe. Scientists

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Speaker 1: used it to study questions about the age and evolution

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Speaker 1: of the universe itself. Hubble observations led to the confirmation

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Speaker 1: that supermassive black holes do in fact exist at the

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Speaker 1: centers of galaxies. Using the Hubble, scientists were able to

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Speaker 1: figure out how far away other galaxies were from our own.

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Speaker 1: The Hubble captured images of weird stars, some of them

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Speaker 1: much more active and unstable than our own son. We

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Speaker 1: should be thankful for that, because our son mostly behaves itself.

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Speaker 1: The Hubble looked at how pieces of a comet crashed

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Speaker 1: into Jupiter, leaving behind large marks on the planet's surface.

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Speaker 1: Scientists used the Hubble to study various moons in our

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Speaker 1: Solar System, leading to the discovery that Jupiter's moon Europa

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Speaker 1: has oxygen in its atmosphere. The Hubble caught images of

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Speaker 1: proto stars and wide angled views of the universe that

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Speaker 1: showed more than fift nd galaxies out there, all before

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Speaker 1: the formal recommendation to NASA and the European Space Agency

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Speaker 1: that they get to work on the next space telescope.

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Speaker 1: But let's move on. Even though we could talk a

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Speaker 1: lot more about the Hubble, the Hubble is still in

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Speaker 1: operation today, even though the last servicing mission was way

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Speaker 1: back in two thousand nine. The James Webb Space Telescope

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Speaker 1: won't be able to get that kind of upkeep, and

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Speaker 1: that's because it's going to occupy an orbit far away

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Speaker 1: from Earth, far too far away for us to access

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Speaker 1: easily for stuff like maintenance, and that means we need

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Speaker 1: to make sure everything is right before we deploy it.

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Speaker 1: Construction on the James Webb Space Telescope began in two

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Speaker 1: thousand four, and it took seven years to make all

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Speaker 1: the mirror segments. They're eighteen in total. Their hexagonal mirror

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Speaker 1: panels that fit together and collectively they serve as the

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Speaker 1: primary mirror for the telescope. So the James Web Space

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Speaker 1: Telescope is going to orbit the second lagrange point a

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Speaker 1: K A L two. But those are just words, right,

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Speaker 1: I mean, what does that actually mean? Well, getting stuff

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Speaker 1: into space is hard, but getting stuff to stay where

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Speaker 1: you need it to once you get it out in

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Speaker 1: space is also hard. You can include stuff like thrusters

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Speaker 1: to help a spacecraft maintain its relative position to some

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Speaker 1: other point of reference, but thrusters require energy to operate,

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Speaker 1: so you can use fuel that fuels heavy has a

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Speaker 1: limited resource. There's no refueling stations out there, so you

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Speaker 1: can't top off the fuel tank once it runs low.

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Speaker 1: So you could potentially use like an ion drive and

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Speaker 1: power it some other way, such as with a radioactive

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Speaker 1: decay or something. But it would be way easier if

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Speaker 1: you could just PLoP something onto a specific point in

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Speaker 1: space and it would just kind of stay there. And

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Speaker 1: by specific point, I mean relative to something else. It's

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Speaker 1: not just occupy a a a point in space and

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Speaker 1: that's where it stays. As the rest of the Solar

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Speaker 1: system continues to move away from it. So a smarty

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Speaker 1: pants mathematician named Joseph Louis Lagrange began to think about

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Speaker 1: orbital paths and whether or not it might be possible

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Speaker 1: to find points in which three different bodies could orbit

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Speaker 1: each other but stay in the same positions relative to

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Speaker 1: one another. So, in other words, unlike say Earthen Mars,

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Speaker 1: let's use that as an example, We've got the Sun,

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Speaker 1: We've got Earth, We've got Mars. Three bodies. Earthen Mars

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Speaker 1: both orbit the Sun, but they both do so at

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Speaker 1: different rates. So sometimes Earthen Mars are on the same

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Speaker 1: side of the Sun, like they're both on. Let's if

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Speaker 1: we're looking top down, let's imagine that both the Earth

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Speaker 1: and Mars are on the right side of the Sun.

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Speaker 1: Mars is a little further out from Earth. Other times though,

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Speaker 1: during those orbits, you get them on opposite sides of

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Speaker 1: the Sun. Maybe the Earth's on the right side but

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Speaker 1: Mars is on the left side. The Sun's in between them,

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Speaker 1: so they are not in the same position relative to

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Speaker 1: each other throughout their orbits. In fact, it takes about

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Speaker 1: two years for the two planets to get close to

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Speaker 1: each other. That's why any planned missions to Mars that

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Speaker 1: involves sending people up there usually also involved camping out

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Speaker 1: on the planet for you know, a couple of years

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Speaker 1: in order to be able to return. However, a stable

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Speaker 1: orbit would mean that the three bodies would remain in

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Speaker 1: their same relative positions. So if Earth is one of

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Speaker 1: the three and the Sun is another, the third body

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Speaker 1: would remain in the same relative position in its orbital path.

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Speaker 1: So this would be like if the Earth and Mars

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Speaker 1: were always lined up in their respective orbits around the Sun.

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Speaker 1: So Mars would always be behind Earth further out, and

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Speaker 1: that would mean Mars would have to be traveling faster

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Speaker 1: through space to keep pace right, because it's traveling greater distance.

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Speaker 1: It's a it's orbit is arger, it's traveling further. It

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Speaker 1: would have to go faster in order to maintain the

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Speaker 1: same position relative to the Earth. That's not happening. However,

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Speaker 1: through mathematics, Lagrange identified five points where this sort of

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Speaker 1: orbit would be possible. So there are five points we've

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Speaker 1: identified where something in that position would pretty much stay

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Speaker 1: there relative to the Earth and the Sun. And that's

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Speaker 1: because these bodies would be exerting roughly equal gravitational forces

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Speaker 1: on that third body out in space, and the same

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Speaker 1: amount of force as that third body was experiencing in

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Speaker 1: the form of centripetal force. That's a lot of words.

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Speaker 1: I know it sounds confusing, but imagine you've got a

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Speaker 1: game of tug of war going on, right, and both

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Speaker 1: sides are of equal strength, and you've got a flag

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Speaker 1: in the center of the tug of war rope, and

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Speaker 1: both sides begin to pull, but they are equally matched.

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Speaker 1: Neither is able to gain any ground on the other,

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Speaker 1: so that flag just stays put. It's being pulled in

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Speaker 1: both directions, but at equal strength, so it's not moving anywhere.

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Speaker 1: That's kind of what a lagrange point is like, only

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Speaker 1: there's no physical rope holding anything because it's all about

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Speaker 1: gravity and centripeleical force. Lagrange point one is between Earth

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Speaker 1: and the Sun, and it's at this point that we

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Speaker 1: put solar observatories like the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory Satellite

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Speaker 1: or SOHO. And as you would imagine, the point for

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Speaker 1: these kinds of observation platforms is to have instruments dedicated

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Speaker 1: to observing the Sun and solar events. But it's not

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Speaker 1: a great location to put something if you want to

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Speaker 1: look at other stuff further out in the universe. Because

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Speaker 1: the amount of electromagnetic energy that's given off by the

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Speaker 1: Sun tends to drown out everything else, it's not a

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Speaker 1: good place to put that kind of thing. Lagrange point, to, however,

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Speaker 1: is on the opposite side of Earth from the Sun,

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Speaker 1: and it's at a distance of one point five million

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Speaker 1: kilometers or around one million miles from Earth. The Moon,

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Speaker 1: by comparison, is three eight four thousand, four hundred kilometers

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Speaker 1: or two d thirty eight thousand, nine hundred miles from Earth,

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Speaker 1: so the James Webb Space Telescope will be a far

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Speaker 1: away from Home, much further away than the Moon is.

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Speaker 1: L two is the old stomping grounds for a few

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Speaker 1: other instruments that we had previously placed there. One was

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Speaker 1: the Wilkinson Microwave and asotropy probe. And I have no

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Speaker 1: idea if I'm saying that correctly. I probably should have

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Speaker 1: looked up the pronunciation beforehand. I apologize for that. We'll

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Speaker 1: call it woe map w m a P. It taught

434
00:26:36,560 --> 00:26:40,040
Speaker 1: us an enormous amount about the universe, largely by studying

435
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:45,000
Speaker 1: cosmic microwave background radiation or CMB radiation. That's the oldest

436
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:48,720
Speaker 1: light in the universe. It's the stuff that occurred shortly

437
00:26:48,760 --> 00:26:51,720
Speaker 1: after the Big Bang according to the Big Bang theory,

438
00:26:52,359 --> 00:26:56,639
Speaker 1: and that is it blows my mind to read up

439
00:26:56,640 --> 00:26:59,719
Speaker 1: about that stuff. The second instrument that was previously at

440
00:26:59,880 --> 00:27:03,960
Speaker 1: L two was called PLANK and it also studied CMB.

441
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:07,919
Speaker 1: The third was the Herschel Space Observatory, which was another

442
00:27:08,000 --> 00:27:12,760
Speaker 1: infrared space telescope. That one operated until until it ran

443
00:27:12,760 --> 00:27:15,840
Speaker 1: out of coolant, and all three of those instruments have

444
00:27:16,080 --> 00:27:19,679
Speaker 1: long been deactivated and relocated to an orbit outside of

445
00:27:19,800 --> 00:27:23,080
Speaker 1: L two, making it free for the James web Space Telescope,

446
00:27:23,560 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 1: now the Hubble Space Telescope orbits the Earth, but again

447
00:27:26,840 --> 00:27:31,400
Speaker 1: the James Webb Space Telescope orbits the Sun. Technically it's

448
00:27:31,440 --> 00:27:35,520
Speaker 1: also orbiting the L two point itself, So if you

449
00:27:35,520 --> 00:27:38,000
Speaker 1: think of the L two point as orbiting the Sun,

450
00:27:38,760 --> 00:27:41,320
Speaker 1: this is orbiting the L two point kind of like

451
00:27:41,359 --> 00:27:44,240
Speaker 1: how the Moon orbits the Earth and Earth orbits the

452
00:27:44,280 --> 00:27:48,480
Speaker 1: Sun similar to that. So it will have a path

453
00:27:48,600 --> 00:27:51,119
Speaker 1: that takes it around the orbit of L two every

454
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:53,960
Speaker 1: six months or so, and it will stay in line

455
00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:57,600
Speaker 1: with Earth during Earth's own orbit of the Sun. So

456
00:27:57,920 --> 00:28:00,399
Speaker 1: in other words, the James Web Space Telescope is always

457
00:28:00,400 --> 00:28:04,400
Speaker 1: going to be uh right back behind where the Earth

458
00:28:04,520 --> 00:28:08,679
Speaker 1: is in its orbit. The James Webb Telescope will occasionally

459
00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:11,960
Speaker 1: need to make some slight adjustments in order to maintain

460
00:28:11,960 --> 00:28:16,280
Speaker 1: its position and orientation. It turns out that those lagrange points,

461
00:28:16,600 --> 00:28:19,600
Speaker 1: some of them are stable, meaning if you put something there,

462
00:28:19,600 --> 00:28:21,439
Speaker 1: it's just gonna stay there, and some of them were

463
00:28:21,480 --> 00:28:25,560
Speaker 1: kind of semi stable, and they require minute adjustments in

464
00:28:25,680 --> 00:28:28,320
Speaker 1: order to maintain position. The L two is one of those,

465
00:28:28,760 --> 00:28:31,800
Speaker 1: so once in a while, in fact, like every twenty

466
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: three days or so, they'll have to be a very

467
00:28:34,160 --> 00:28:37,040
Speaker 1: slight adjustment in order for the James Web Space Telescope

468
00:28:37,080 --> 00:28:39,920
Speaker 1: to maintain its position. It's not a lot of work

469
00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:42,320
Speaker 1: to do it, but it is something that has to

470
00:28:42,360 --> 00:28:46,040
Speaker 1: happen regularly, or as you would imagine, you quickly start

471
00:28:46,080 --> 00:28:48,960
Speaker 1: to fall out of step. Now, the James Webb Space

472
00:28:48,960 --> 00:28:52,440
Speaker 1: Telescope has a large shield that will protect it from

473
00:28:52,640 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 1: radiation coming from the Sun. That shield is actually made

474
00:28:55,080 --> 00:28:57,360
Speaker 1: up of a membrane. I'll talk about it a little

475
00:28:57,360 --> 00:29:00,880
Speaker 1: bit more, uh in a second and down. It's also

476
00:29:01,040 --> 00:29:04,120
Speaker 1: to protect it from radiation that's reflected off of bodies

477
00:29:04,200 --> 00:29:07,160
Speaker 1: like the Earth and the Moon. It will effectively shade

478
00:29:07,400 --> 00:29:11,480
Speaker 1: the mirror side of the telescope so that the telescope

479
00:29:11,480 --> 00:29:14,600
Speaker 1: can gather distant light. It's orbit around L two will

480
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:18,040
Speaker 1: also mean that the spacecraft is going to avoid shadows

481
00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:20,760
Speaker 1: that are cast by Earth in the Moon, which would

482
00:29:20,760 --> 00:29:24,400
Speaker 1: otherwise affect its view outward to the universe. Now, the

483
00:29:24,440 --> 00:29:27,120
Speaker 1: type of light that the James Webb Space Telescope is

484
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 1: really relying upon is primarily light in the infrared spectrum.

485
00:29:31,720 --> 00:29:35,320
Speaker 1: We can feel infrared light, we can experience it as heat,

486
00:29:35,480 --> 00:29:38,600
Speaker 1: but we can't see it unaided. Right it's outside the

487
00:29:38,680 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 1: visible spectrum of light. The telescope will be seeking out

488
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:46,760
Speaker 1: infrared light from distant sources, which means trace amounts are

489
00:29:46,760 --> 00:29:49,480
Speaker 1: going to be very faint, and that's why the telescope

490
00:29:49,520 --> 00:29:52,760
Speaker 1: needs an effective heat shield, or else the heat from

491
00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:57,360
Speaker 1: nearby sources primarily the Sun and surfaces that are reflecting

492
00:29:57,440 --> 00:29:59,960
Speaker 1: light from the Sun, that would be all the Tell

493
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:02,960
Speaker 1: scope would be able to pick up otherwise. In fact,

494
00:30:03,160 --> 00:30:06,840
Speaker 1: the telescope is so sensitive that the electronics and computer

495
00:30:07,000 --> 00:30:10,680
Speaker 1: that attached to it are on the shield side of

496
00:30:10,720 --> 00:30:15,000
Speaker 1: the spacecraft because they generate heat, so rather than have

497
00:30:15,120 --> 00:30:19,720
Speaker 1: them close to the telescope part and potentially corrupt results

498
00:30:19,760 --> 00:30:23,160
Speaker 1: because the heat generated by the electronics is strong enough

499
00:30:23,200 --> 00:30:26,320
Speaker 1: to to affect it. It's actually located on the other

500
00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:28,520
Speaker 1: side of the heat shield, on the hot side and

501
00:30:28,520 --> 00:30:32,160
Speaker 1: on the cold side. On the shield side facing the sun,

502
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:35,240
Speaker 1: the temperature on that surface will reach around eighty five

503
00:30:35,240 --> 00:30:38,600
Speaker 1: degrees celsius or a hundred eighty five fahrenheit. So if

504
00:30:38,640 --> 00:30:41,440
Speaker 1: it got much warmer, it would be possible to actually

505
00:30:41,480 --> 00:30:44,239
Speaker 1: boil water on that side of the spacecraft. But on

506
00:30:44,320 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 1: the mirror side, the telescope side, things are way different.

507
00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:51,880
Speaker 1: The temperature will be around minus two hundred thirty three

508
00:30:51,880 --> 00:30:57,320
Speaker 1: degrees celsius or minus three fahrenheit. Now you can see

509
00:30:57,600 --> 00:31:00,840
Speaker 1: from this incredible difference in timber chures that it is

510
00:31:00,880 --> 00:31:04,200
Speaker 1: of paramount importance to keep the telescope in the proper

511
00:31:04,240 --> 00:31:08,360
Speaker 1: orientation with the shield side facing the sun. That's one

512
00:31:08,360 --> 00:31:10,760
Speaker 1: of the big reasons we're putting it at L two.

513
00:31:11,200 --> 00:31:14,600
Speaker 1: After launch, it will take the telescope about thirty days

514
00:31:14,640 --> 00:31:18,200
Speaker 1: to reach the L two orbital point. But here's the thing.

515
00:31:18,680 --> 00:31:21,920
Speaker 1: It will make most of that journey right away it's

516
00:31:21,960 --> 00:31:24,400
Speaker 1: that last bit that takes the longest, as the goal

517
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,000
Speaker 1: is to give the telescope a push just hard enough

518
00:31:28,520 --> 00:31:31,920
Speaker 1: so that it arrives at its proper spot to enter

519
00:31:31,960 --> 00:31:35,080
Speaker 1: its orbital path around L two. And I think of

520
00:31:35,120 --> 00:31:37,680
Speaker 1: it kind of like curling the sport, where you know,

521
00:31:37,720 --> 00:31:41,959
Speaker 1: you slide weights down an iced surface, only you know,

522
00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:44,760
Speaker 1: in this case we're talking about three dimensions, not two,

523
00:31:45,080 --> 00:31:47,040
Speaker 1: and we're also talking about being in space, not on

524
00:31:47,080 --> 00:31:49,800
Speaker 1: the ice. And also the weight in this case is

525
00:31:50,160 --> 00:31:52,719
Speaker 1: a telescope that's worth a few billion dollars. Also, there

526
00:31:52,720 --> 00:31:56,120
Speaker 1: are no Canadians out there sweeping ice into or out

527
00:31:56,120 --> 00:31:59,400
Speaker 1: of the pathway. But otherwise it's exactly the same as curling.

528
00:31:59,800 --> 00:32:02,360
Speaker 1: Another reason we're putting it in the L two orbit

529
00:32:02,680 --> 00:32:04,480
Speaker 1: is that because it will always be in the same

530
00:32:04,520 --> 00:32:07,360
Speaker 1: position relative to Earth's orbit, which means we can communicate

531
00:32:07,400 --> 00:32:11,480
Speaker 1: with that telescope relatively easily. Communications will carry out through

532
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:15,160
Speaker 1: radio signals, and one of three large antennas here on

533
00:32:15,200 --> 00:32:17,720
Speaker 1: Earth will be in contact with the spacecraft at any

534
00:32:17,760 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 1: given time. They are located in California in the United States, Spain,

535
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:26,680
Speaker 1: and Australia, so that at any time of day, there's

536
00:32:26,720 --> 00:32:30,240
Speaker 1: the chance to be able to establish communications with the telescope.

537
00:32:30,760 --> 00:32:34,320
Speaker 1: This collectively is called the Deep Space Network, which sounds

538
00:32:34,360 --> 00:32:36,840
Speaker 1: like we've got a lot of antenna floating out there

539
00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:39,960
Speaker 1: in space, but really it's more about having the infrastructure

540
00:32:40,040 --> 00:32:43,200
Speaker 1: here on Earth that lets us monitor our instruments that

541
00:32:43,240 --> 00:32:45,680
Speaker 1: are out in space, no matter what part of Earth

542
00:32:45,800 --> 00:32:49,800
Speaker 1: is facing towards those instruments at any given time. Up

543
00:32:49,800 --> 00:32:52,440
Speaker 1: to twice a day, the telescope will connect with Earth

544
00:32:52,560 --> 00:32:55,840
Speaker 1: so that scientists can upload new instructions to the telescope

545
00:32:55,880 --> 00:32:59,920
Speaker 1: and download the gathered data from the telescope. The plan, however,

546
00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:03,040
Speaker 1: is to really upload a whole week's worth of commands

547
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:06,480
Speaker 1: all at once, and then occasionally do updates, like if

548
00:33:06,520 --> 00:33:08,880
Speaker 1: you need to tweak things, you could send up another

549
00:33:09,000 --> 00:33:11,680
Speaker 1: up link later in the week. I think it's worthwhile

550
00:33:11,720 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 1: to talk a bit about the planned launch for the telescope.

551
00:33:15,240 --> 00:33:19,160
Speaker 1: It's to happen in French Guyana, that's the chosen launch point.

552
00:33:19,320 --> 00:33:22,960
Speaker 1: It will be carried up into space on an Arean

553
00:33:23,360 --> 00:33:27,640
Speaker 1: five heavy lift launch vehicle. That name a vehicle might

554
00:33:27,680 --> 00:33:31,640
Speaker 1: sound a little unfamiliar to my fellow Americans. It was

555
00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:33,960
Speaker 1: to me, and it's a vehicle that's used by the

556
00:33:33,960 --> 00:33:37,440
Speaker 1: European Space Agency or e s A. The launch up

557
00:33:37,480 --> 00:33:40,360
Speaker 1: to space will take about eight minutes of thrust to

558
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:44,160
Speaker 1: get up there, and a half hour after its launch,

559
00:33:44,480 --> 00:33:49,360
Speaker 1: the telescope will separate from its uh it's little faring

560
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:52,560
Speaker 1: with the remains of the launch vehicle and continue on

561
00:33:52,600 --> 00:33:55,400
Speaker 1: its journey by itself. The telescope will be on its

562
00:33:55,440 --> 00:33:59,120
Speaker 1: trajectory out toward L two, though there will be a

563
00:33:59,160 --> 00:34:02,800
Speaker 1: couple of different trajectory correction maneuvers made along the way

564
00:34:03,240 --> 00:34:06,720
Speaker 1: to ensure it reaches its destination properly. When we come back,

565
00:34:07,240 --> 00:34:10,960
Speaker 1: I'll walk through the rest of the deployment process of

566
00:34:11,000 --> 00:34:14,480
Speaker 1: the telescope, and we'll talk a little bit about the

567
00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:17,600
Speaker 1: telescope itself and some of the things it's going to

568
00:34:17,640 --> 00:34:20,920
Speaker 1: be looking for, and we'll also get to talk about

569
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:25,000
Speaker 1: my tattoo. And like I said, perhaps in a subsequent episode,

570
00:34:25,280 --> 00:34:30,719
Speaker 1: I'll go into more detail about the telescopes mechanical systems

571
00:34:30,840 --> 00:34:34,560
Speaker 1: and instruments. But let first let's take a quick break.

572
00:34:41,880 --> 00:34:44,600
Speaker 1: So before the break, I talked about the launch and

573
00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:47,440
Speaker 1: the separation of the James Webb Space Telescope from the

574
00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:50,200
Speaker 1: launch vehicle, and assuming all of that goes as planned,

575
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:55,360
Speaker 1: here's what should happen in the following minutes, hours, days, weeks, etcetera.

576
00:34:55,880 --> 00:34:59,320
Speaker 1: At about thirty three minutes into the mission, the spacecraft

577
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:02,920
Speaker 1: will deploy it's solar array. This is an array of

578
00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:06,719
Speaker 1: solar panels that will harvest energy from the sun help

579
00:35:06,719 --> 00:35:11,360
Speaker 1: power the telescope. So it's on one side of this telescope.

580
00:35:11,400 --> 00:35:14,360
Speaker 1: It's on the aft side, the rear side of the spacecraft,

581
00:35:14,360 --> 00:35:16,560
Speaker 1: if you think of it that way. It's a little

582
00:35:16,560 --> 00:35:18,960
Speaker 1: weird to call it aft because until the whole thing

583
00:35:19,040 --> 00:35:21,520
Speaker 1: is deployed, you can't really tell what is for and

584
00:35:21,560 --> 00:35:25,480
Speaker 1: what is aft. It looks kind of like a rectangular

585
00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:29,520
Speaker 1: spacecraft floating out in space, and one panel on one

586
00:35:29,560 --> 00:35:33,160
Speaker 1: side of the rectangle folds down, and that's your that's

587
00:35:33,160 --> 00:35:36,799
Speaker 1: your panel of solar or your rather your array of

588
00:35:36,840 --> 00:35:40,720
Speaker 1: solar panels, I should say. Well. Two hours after having launched,

589
00:35:40,920 --> 00:35:44,560
Speaker 1: the spacecraft will release its high gain antenna. This is

590
00:35:44,600 --> 00:35:47,960
Speaker 1: a focused directional antenna designed to target radio signals with

591
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:52,560
Speaker 1: great precision. This is how we communicate with the James

592
00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:56,680
Speaker 1: Web Space Telescope. It's the antenna that receives and transmits

593
00:35:57,239 --> 00:36:00,120
Speaker 1: information and it's uh the same sort of thing that

594
00:36:00,160 --> 00:36:03,040
Speaker 1: we use for long range wireless networks here on Earth.

595
00:36:03,480 --> 00:36:06,680
Speaker 1: It will actually fully deploy within that first day of

596
00:36:06,680 --> 00:36:08,960
Speaker 1: the mission. It's released early on, but it takes a

597
00:36:08,960 --> 00:36:12,120
Speaker 1: while for it to fully deploy. Twelve hours into the

598
00:36:12,200 --> 00:36:15,440
Speaker 1: journey and we'll get our first trajectory correction maneuvers. The

599
00:36:15,480 --> 00:36:18,800
Speaker 1: spacecraft has small rocket engines on which it can fire

600
00:36:18,840 --> 00:36:23,400
Speaker 1: thrusters and very quick precise burns and thus make course corrections.

601
00:36:23,760 --> 00:36:26,920
Speaker 1: Another trajectory correction will happen a couple of days later

602
00:36:27,200 --> 00:36:31,239
Speaker 1: as it continues its journey. The spacecraft's sun shield is

603
00:36:31,280 --> 00:36:35,839
Speaker 1: in two very large panels, or palettes as NASA calls them.

604
00:36:35,840 --> 00:36:39,680
Speaker 1: The shield that is opposite the solar arrays. Remember that

605
00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:43,480
Speaker 1: that folds down first, while on the opposite side of

606
00:36:43,480 --> 00:36:47,000
Speaker 1: the spacecraft is what is called the forward shield, and

607
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:51,279
Speaker 1: that will first deploy by folding down away from the telescope,

608
00:36:51,520 --> 00:36:55,680
Speaker 1: so it's opposite where the solar panel arrays have folded down,

609
00:36:56,000 --> 00:36:59,279
Speaker 1: and once deployed, the aft palette will do the same. Now,

610
00:36:59,320 --> 00:37:02,480
Speaker 1: this one's on the aim side as the solar array,

611
00:37:02,920 --> 00:37:05,839
Speaker 1: so it folds down and it ends up being parallel

612
00:37:06,400 --> 00:37:10,080
Speaker 1: to the solar array. The series of panels that are

613
00:37:10,120 --> 00:37:14,960
Speaker 1: collecting light and powering the telescope. Then the telescope apparatus

614
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:18,360
Speaker 1: will extend outward from the base of the spacecraft. It

615
00:37:19,520 --> 00:37:22,319
Speaker 1: kind of telescopes out if you will. This part of

616
00:37:22,320 --> 00:37:25,319
Speaker 1: the process is called tower deployment. So really it's just

617
00:37:25,360 --> 00:37:27,919
Speaker 1: like if you think of an old radio antenna where

618
00:37:27,920 --> 00:37:31,239
Speaker 1: you would extend the antenna. That's effectively what's happening here.

619
00:37:31,239 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 1: It's about creating a little more distance between the telescope

620
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:38,839
Speaker 1: itself and the solar shield so that there's not any

621
00:37:38,880 --> 00:37:42,560
Speaker 1: heat transfer, because again, this thing is incredibly sensitive to heat.

622
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:47,640
Speaker 1: Then the spacecraft will deploy a solar membrane. It's kind

623
00:37:47,640 --> 00:37:51,680
Speaker 1: of like foil, and by deploy, I mean it unrolls

624
00:37:51,760 --> 00:37:55,880
Speaker 1: this foil so that it spreads across the aft and

625
00:37:56,000 --> 00:37:59,839
Speaker 1: forward sun shield palettes and then connects to two ex

626
00:38:00,080 --> 00:38:06,680
Speaker 1: endable arms. Those extendable arms then extend, pulling that membrane

627
00:38:07,080 --> 00:38:10,520
Speaker 1: further outward to form the solar shield. And I get

628
00:38:10,520 --> 00:38:12,080
Speaker 1: that it can be a little hard to understand what

629
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:14,680
Speaker 1: I'm talking about here, but imagine it's kind of like

630
00:38:14,760 --> 00:38:18,320
Speaker 1: stretching a blanket outward, only in this case, the blanket

631
00:38:18,360 --> 00:38:21,040
Speaker 1: is meant to keep the heat off the telescope rather

632
00:38:21,080 --> 00:38:24,520
Speaker 1: than trap heat. In eleven days into the mission, the

633
00:38:24,520 --> 00:38:28,480
Speaker 1: telescope will start it's cryo cooler to start to cool

634
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:32,279
Speaker 1: the telescope components down to operating temperature, and then the

635
00:38:32,320 --> 00:38:36,040
Speaker 1: telescope will deploy its secondary mirror. So let's talk about

636
00:38:36,080 --> 00:38:40,200
Speaker 1: that for a second. Imagine a satellite dish like the

637
00:38:40,239 --> 00:38:42,080
Speaker 1: kind we would have here on Earth for you know,

638
00:38:42,239 --> 00:38:45,640
Speaker 1: cable or whatever. Now, normally you would have the dish

639
00:38:46,040 --> 00:38:49,560
Speaker 1: and then suspended above and the dish like at the

640
00:38:49,640 --> 00:38:51,799
Speaker 1: center of the dish and above it you would have

641
00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:55,319
Speaker 1: an antenna be held there, and the idea being that

642
00:38:55,680 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 1: this parabola of the dish is reflecting radio signals up

643
00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:05,240
Speaker 1: to that antenna so that you get a good, strong signal.

644
00:39:05,840 --> 00:39:09,200
Speaker 1: That's the idea here. Well, the telescope is similar, except

645
00:39:09,200 --> 00:39:13,680
Speaker 1: instead of having an antenna suspended above the parabola, it's

646
00:39:13,719 --> 00:39:17,880
Speaker 1: a small mirror and it's this mirror's job, the secondary mirror,

647
00:39:18,200 --> 00:39:23,759
Speaker 1: to reflect light from the primary mirror down into the

648
00:39:24,000 --> 00:39:28,239
Speaker 1: sensors for the telescope. It's it's actually directing the collected

649
00:39:28,360 --> 00:39:32,400
Speaker 1: light to the instruments on the James Web Space Telescope itself,

650
00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:34,960
Speaker 1: So it's a mirror that's pointing back. It's kind of

651
00:39:35,000 --> 00:39:38,360
Speaker 1: selfie like it's pointing back at the telescope. Now, twelve

652
00:39:38,440 --> 00:39:42,879
Speaker 1: days in, the telescope will begin wing deployment. Now, these

653
00:39:42,880 --> 00:39:45,719
Speaker 1: wings aren't meant for flying, the rather wings of the

654
00:39:45,760 --> 00:39:49,000
Speaker 1: primary mirror. You might remember I mentioned that the primary

655
00:39:49,040 --> 00:39:52,880
Speaker 1: mirror for the James Webb Space Telescope is made up

656
00:39:52,880 --> 00:39:57,040
Speaker 1: of hexagonal panels, eighteen of them. And those hexagonal panels

657
00:39:57,080 --> 00:40:00,319
Speaker 1: mean that you can actually have these foldable seg mints

658
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:04,279
Speaker 1: of the telescope unfold and connect together so that the

659
00:40:04,400 --> 00:40:07,000
Speaker 1: edges of one hexagon line up with the edges of

660
00:40:07,040 --> 00:40:12,600
Speaker 1: other hexagons, and collectively the eighteen hexagons make the primary mirror.

661
00:40:12,640 --> 00:40:16,680
Speaker 1: This is different from the Hubble Space Telescope, which had

662
00:40:16,719 --> 00:40:21,719
Speaker 1: an unbroken single piece as a mirror. So a very

663
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:25,120
Speaker 1: interesting approach here. Uh. Those panels, by the way, are

664
00:40:25,239 --> 00:40:30,600
Speaker 1: incredibly reflective and very sensitive. They look amazing. You can

665
00:40:30,640 --> 00:40:34,000
Speaker 1: see pictures and videos of them online. I highly recommend

666
00:40:34,040 --> 00:40:37,680
Speaker 1: you check them out. They're gorgeous. So the first wing

667
00:40:37,800 --> 00:40:44,160
Speaker 1: unfolds and joins the central collection of hexagonal panels twelve

668
00:40:44,239 --> 00:40:48,920
Speaker 1: days in and fourteen days in the secondary wing will unfold,

669
00:40:49,480 --> 00:40:52,759
Speaker 1: and then you have the full primary mirror made up

670
00:40:52,800 --> 00:40:57,319
Speaker 1: of all these hexagons. However, it won't be actually focused yet,

671
00:40:57,360 --> 00:41:01,200
Speaker 1: it'll just be in the main position where they're all

672
00:41:01,480 --> 00:41:04,120
Speaker 1: kind of, you know, next to each other. At thirty

673
00:41:04,120 --> 00:41:08,400
Speaker 1: three days, the telescope will begin effectively field testing. The

674
00:41:08,440 --> 00:41:11,680
Speaker 1: instruments will come on and engineers will point the telescope

675
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:14,560
Speaker 1: to a crowded area of space, you know, someplace it's

676
00:41:14,560 --> 00:41:16,680
Speaker 1: got a lot of stars in it, it's generating a

677
00:41:16,719 --> 00:41:19,320
Speaker 1: good amount of light. This is just to make sure

678
00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:23,680
Speaker 1: that the telescope is in fact detecting light, that the

679
00:41:23,800 --> 00:41:26,319
Speaker 1: light is hitting the mirrors, that's getting reflected and it's

680
00:41:26,320 --> 00:41:28,880
Speaker 1: being picked up by the telescope sensors. So at this

681
00:41:28,920 --> 00:41:32,360
Speaker 1: stage the mirrors are not aligned properly to get super

682
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 1: sharp images. It's really just to verify that everything is

683
00:41:36,000 --> 00:41:39,120
Speaker 1: actually kind of working, assuming it is. Then around forty

684
00:41:39,239 --> 00:41:41,920
Speaker 1: four days into the mission, the telescope will begin making

685
00:41:41,960 --> 00:41:45,160
Speaker 1: fine adjustments to each of the mirrors that have them

686
00:41:45,280 --> 00:41:48,560
Speaker 1: line up to form the prime mirror, and the secondary

687
00:41:48,560 --> 00:41:51,640
Speaker 1: mirror will also get fine tuned adjustments in order to

688
00:41:51,719 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 1: start to bring things into focus. And this is a

689
00:41:55,440 --> 00:41:59,440
Speaker 1: painstaking process. It's one that involves lots of motors that

690
00:41:59,440 --> 00:42:03,560
Speaker 1: will talk out in a subsequent episode, but just know

691
00:42:03,719 --> 00:42:07,439
Speaker 1: that it's about a lot of tiny adjustments. It will

692
00:42:07,440 --> 00:42:10,480
Speaker 1: take actually about three months after the launch for the

693
00:42:10,480 --> 00:42:14,440
Speaker 1: telescope to start returning images that are around the quality

694
00:42:14,520 --> 00:42:17,400
Speaker 1: we would expect from it for the rest of its mission.

695
00:42:18,040 --> 00:42:21,800
Speaker 1: It will, however, be about six months after launch before

696
00:42:21,840 --> 00:42:24,200
Speaker 1: the telescope actually gets down to some serious work and

697
00:42:24,239 --> 00:42:26,520
Speaker 1: starts to collect data we hope will tell us more

698
00:42:26,560 --> 00:42:29,480
Speaker 1: about our universe. So what kind of stuff is it

699
00:42:29,520 --> 00:42:32,239
Speaker 1: going to be looking for. Well, part of that will

700
00:42:32,280 --> 00:42:35,719
Speaker 1: be evidence of how the first galaxies formed billions of

701
00:42:35,800 --> 00:42:38,400
Speaker 1: years ago, to learn more about the evolution of the

702
00:42:38,440 --> 00:42:42,239
Speaker 1: universe itself. We've got a lot of hypotheses about how

703
00:42:42,280 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 1: the universe formed. This telescope is going to seek out

704
00:42:45,280 --> 00:42:48,719
Speaker 1: information that will either lend support or maybe call into

705
00:42:48,800 --> 00:42:53,200
Speaker 1: question those hypotheses. It will also look at dust clouds

706
00:42:53,239 --> 00:42:55,360
Speaker 1: so that we can learn more about how stuff like

707
00:42:55,560 --> 00:42:59,840
Speaker 1: stars and planets form over billions of years. Again, we

708
00:43:00,040 --> 00:43:02,200
Speaker 1: got a lot of thoughts about this, and this telescope

709
00:43:02,239 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 1: will help us gain a deeper understanding of cosmological events

710
00:43:06,080 --> 00:43:09,680
Speaker 1: and because the James Webb is relying on infrared light

711
00:43:10,200 --> 00:43:12,400
Speaker 1: that in for a light it can penetrate stuff like

712
00:43:12,560 --> 00:43:15,160
Speaker 1: dust clouds, so we'll be able to get better information

713
00:43:15,160 --> 00:43:18,600
Speaker 1: about those formations in the universe. For a telescope like

714
00:43:18,640 --> 00:43:22,480
Speaker 1: the Hubble, which primarily relied on visible light, we were

715
00:43:22,520 --> 00:43:26,719
Speaker 1: really limited because the dust clouds appeared opaque to that

716
00:43:26,840 --> 00:43:29,560
Speaker 1: kind of telescope. But the James Webb will be able

717
00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:32,719
Speaker 1: to see through and into these dust clouds and we'll

718
00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:35,279
Speaker 1: get a lot more information about them. So a lot

719
00:43:35,400 --> 00:43:38,160
Speaker 1: about what the James Webb Space Telescope is going to

720
00:43:38,160 --> 00:43:43,360
Speaker 1: be exploring will relate to questions about how massive celestial

721
00:43:43,400 --> 00:43:48,320
Speaker 1: bodies form over time, from planets to suns to entire galaxies,

722
00:43:48,719 --> 00:43:53,480
Speaker 1: and how they evolve. These are really big cosmological subjects.

723
00:43:54,160 --> 00:43:56,600
Speaker 1: But the telescope will also come in handy when we

724
00:43:56,640 --> 00:44:00,600
Speaker 1: start looking at various extrasolar planets, meaning it's outside of

725
00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:03,319
Speaker 1: our own Solar system. The telescope will give us more

726
00:44:03,360 --> 00:44:07,560
Speaker 1: information about stuff like the atmosphere around distant planets. We've

727
00:44:07,600 --> 00:44:10,840
Speaker 1: identified a lot of exoplanets that exist in what we

728
00:44:10,920 --> 00:44:15,000
Speaker 1: call the Goldilocks zone, that is, the planets exist in

729
00:44:15,080 --> 00:44:19,160
Speaker 1: an orbit that's the right range of distance from their

730
00:44:19,160 --> 00:44:23,759
Speaker 1: host star, so that liquid water could potentially exist on

731
00:44:23,800 --> 00:44:27,000
Speaker 1: those planets. Now, that doesn't actually mean that there is

732
00:44:27,120 --> 00:44:30,520
Speaker 1: water on any of those planets, but rather that the

733
00:44:30,560 --> 00:44:33,680
Speaker 1: planet should be at a temperature that is warm enough

734
00:44:33,719 --> 00:44:36,240
Speaker 1: to have liquid water on it, but not so warm

735
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:39,480
Speaker 1: that liquid water would just evaporate off of it. The

736
00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:42,239
Speaker 1: distance a planet should be from its host star is

737
00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:46,200
Speaker 1: dependent upon stuff like the star's size and its age.

738
00:44:46,440 --> 00:44:48,640
Speaker 1: That tells you how far away a planet would need

739
00:44:48,680 --> 00:44:50,960
Speaker 1: to be in order for liquid water to exist there.

740
00:44:51,000 --> 00:44:54,480
Speaker 1: There are other elements as well. That's getting into a

741
00:44:54,520 --> 00:44:57,959
Speaker 1: whole rabbit hole. Well, the James Web Space Telescope should

742
00:44:58,000 --> 00:45:00,600
Speaker 1: be able to tell us about whether planet it's like

743
00:45:00,800 --> 00:45:06,000
Speaker 1: that have an atmosphere and what that atmosphere's composition should be.

744
00:45:06,320 --> 00:45:10,040
Speaker 1: To do this, they'll use a couple of different things together,

745
00:45:10,400 --> 00:45:13,680
Speaker 1: the transit method, which is where you're looking for the

746
00:45:13,719 --> 00:45:17,759
Speaker 1: existence of planets by looking at the dimming of light

747
00:45:17,880 --> 00:45:20,680
Speaker 1: coming from a star. That indicates that something has passed

748
00:45:20,719 --> 00:45:24,200
Speaker 1: between the star and you. So if you detect this

749
00:45:24,320 --> 00:45:27,960
Speaker 1: and it's happening at regular intervals, you can make the

750
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:30,960
Speaker 1: guess that there is an orbit there's something in orbit

751
00:45:31,000 --> 00:45:33,359
Speaker 1: around that star that's blocking a little bit of light

752
00:45:33,840 --> 00:45:37,320
Speaker 1: at every given increment of time, however long it may be.

753
00:45:38,200 --> 00:45:42,319
Speaker 1: And then we would also use spectroscopy, which is in

754
00:45:42,400 --> 00:45:46,080
Speaker 1: practice where you measure the intensity of light at different

755
00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:50,200
Speaker 1: wavelengths of light. So by determining which wavelengths of light

756
00:45:50,320 --> 00:45:53,240
Speaker 1: are more present, we can start to draw conclusions about

757
00:45:53,320 --> 00:45:57,440
Speaker 1: stuff that might be in a planet's atmosphere. So we

758
00:45:57,480 --> 00:46:00,640
Speaker 1: have to remember that's light that's passing through the atmosphere

759
00:46:00,880 --> 00:46:05,160
Speaker 1: from its host star. So you kind of take a fingerprint,

760
00:46:05,280 --> 00:46:09,359
Speaker 1: a spectral fingerprint of that star's light. You say, this

761
00:46:09,400 --> 00:46:12,480
Speaker 1: star is giving off light, and these are the the

762
00:46:12,560 --> 00:46:16,320
Speaker 1: intensity of the different frequencies of light it's giving off. However,

763
00:46:16,400 --> 00:46:20,440
Speaker 1: when the planet passes over the star, we start to

764
00:46:20,480 --> 00:46:24,640
Speaker 1: detect little changes in that digital fingerprint that to us

765
00:46:24,719 --> 00:46:28,920
Speaker 1: would indicate things that are in that planet's atmosphere that

766
00:46:29,000 --> 00:46:32,040
Speaker 1: could be absorbing those wavelengths of light. And thus we

767
00:46:32,080 --> 00:46:35,640
Speaker 1: can say, hey, turns out we think there's oxygen on

768
00:46:36,280 --> 00:46:38,680
Speaker 1: the atmosphere or in the atmosphere of this planet, which

769
00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:42,319
Speaker 1: is really cool, right. Well, scientists will also use the

770
00:46:42,320 --> 00:46:45,440
Speaker 1: telescope to study stuff that's in our own solar system,

771
00:46:45,560 --> 00:46:48,360
Speaker 1: not just outside of it, like our good buddy Mars.

772
00:46:48,840 --> 00:46:52,759
Speaker 1: Working in concert with orbiters and landers that are dedicated

773
00:46:52,840 --> 00:46:56,120
Speaker 1: to studying Mars, the James web Space Telescope will help

774
00:46:56,200 --> 00:46:59,719
Speaker 1: us get a better understanding of Mars' atmosphere, it's weather,

775
00:46:59,800 --> 00:47:02,920
Speaker 1: pa letterns, it will help us, you know, back up

776
00:47:03,160 --> 00:47:06,239
Speaker 1: the information that's being found by these other instruments, and

777
00:47:06,280 --> 00:47:09,160
Speaker 1: it will also study other bodies within our own solar system,

778
00:47:09,239 --> 00:47:12,000
Speaker 1: not just Mars, but other planets as well. It's all

779
00:47:12,000 --> 00:47:15,520
Speaker 1: really exciting stuff, in fact, exciting enough for me to

780
00:47:15,600 --> 00:47:20,040
Speaker 1: choose to get a tattoo representing the mission of the telescope.

781
00:47:20,440 --> 00:47:25,279
Speaker 1: So here's the story. Back in November, NASA selected a

782
00:47:25,280 --> 00:47:27,960
Speaker 1: group of artists to take part in a big art

783
00:47:28,040 --> 00:47:32,520
Speaker 1: project inspired by the James Webb Space Telescope. Among those

784
00:47:32,640 --> 00:47:36,640
Speaker 1: artists was a tattoo artist from Atlanta named Brandy smart.

785
00:47:37,200 --> 00:47:40,759
Speaker 1: So she pitched an idea she would create eighteen tattoos

786
00:47:41,080 --> 00:47:45,840
Speaker 1: to represent those eighteen mirrored panels for the primary mirror

787
00:47:45,880 --> 00:47:49,880
Speaker 1: of the James Webb Space Telescope. Each tattoo would represent

788
00:47:50,080 --> 00:47:53,440
Speaker 1: something that the James Webb Space Telescope would be looking

789
00:47:53,560 --> 00:47:56,719
Speaker 1: for and She started to search around for people who

790
00:47:56,719 --> 00:47:59,799
Speaker 1: wanted to participate in our project, and I volunteered and

791
00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:03,040
Speaker 1: she took me up on it. So in I went

792
00:48:03,120 --> 00:48:06,000
Speaker 1: to get my space tattoo from Brandy Smart, and I

793
00:48:06,080 --> 00:48:09,400
Speaker 1: chose the image of a proto star. This image was

794
00:48:09,400 --> 00:48:12,440
Speaker 1: actually caught by the Hubble Space Telescope. I mean, obviously

795
00:48:12,440 --> 00:48:15,520
Speaker 1: I couldn't pick anything from the James Webb Space Telescope

796
00:48:15,560 --> 00:48:19,280
Speaker 1: because it hadn't launched yet. So I like the idea

797
00:48:19,800 --> 00:48:22,480
Speaker 1: of going with the proto star. That's a body that

798
00:48:22,680 --> 00:48:27,640
Speaker 1: could continue to gain mass and develop and become a

799
00:48:27,680 --> 00:48:32,080
Speaker 1: true star. Or it might not. It might not gather

800
00:48:32,280 --> 00:48:35,640
Speaker 1: enough mass, there might not be enough gas and particles

801
00:48:35,640 --> 00:48:39,719
Speaker 1: and dust for it to gather enough to become a star.

802
00:48:39,800 --> 00:48:43,520
Speaker 1: It could eventually just fizzle out. I feel like that

803
00:48:43,640 --> 00:48:46,040
Speaker 1: speaks to me on a deep personal level. So that's

804
00:48:46,040 --> 00:48:48,879
Speaker 1: what I chose. And we actually shot a video for

805
00:48:49,239 --> 00:48:52,800
Speaker 1: the series I used to host years ago called Forward Thinking,

806
00:48:53,440 --> 00:48:55,919
Speaker 1: and in that video I was talking about the James

807
00:48:56,000 --> 00:48:59,759
Speaker 1: Webb Space Telescope as well as showing me getting that

808
00:49:00,160 --> 00:49:04,400
Speaker 1: to The video published in December. At the time, the

809
00:49:04,480 --> 00:49:08,560
Speaker 1: James Web Space Telescope was aiming to launch in but

810
00:49:08,719 --> 00:49:12,640
Speaker 1: clearly that just didn't happen anyway. The video title is

811
00:49:12,840 --> 00:49:16,520
Speaker 1: Staring into Space and it's on the Forward Thinking channel

812
00:49:16,640 --> 00:49:21,040
Speaker 1: f W. Colin Thinking. If you're curious, the full collection

813
00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:24,840
Speaker 1: of Brandy's project is viewable on the website j W

814
00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:31,640
Speaker 1: s T dot nasa dot gov slash content, slash features,

815
00:49:32,000 --> 00:49:38,399
Speaker 1: slash j W st art. Yeah, that's um, that's how

816
00:49:38,440 --> 00:49:41,960
Speaker 1: government websites work. Anyway, Look for Brandy Smart's name if

817
00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:45,600
Speaker 1: you look at that website. My tattoo is in the

818
00:49:45,680 --> 00:49:50,440
Speaker 1: hexagon that's just below the blank center spot in that group.

819
00:49:51,040 --> 00:49:55,040
Speaker 1: So yeah, my skin is part of NASA's history, I guess,

820
00:49:55,360 --> 00:49:57,640
Speaker 1: and it means I feel a special connection with this

821
00:49:57,760 --> 00:50:02,440
Speaker 1: amazing piece of technology, particularly when the ditches and imagined

822
00:50:02,480 --> 00:50:04,520
Speaker 1: to see it get to L two and start capturing

823
00:50:04,520 --> 00:50:07,799
Speaker 1: amazing images. So, like I said, I'll probably do a

824
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:11,080
Speaker 1: follow up episode where I'll dive into greater detail in

825
00:50:11,160 --> 00:50:15,279
Speaker 1: the technology and instruments of the James Webb Space Telescope,

826
00:50:15,320 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 1: how they work and what sort of way they will

827
00:50:18,600 --> 00:50:21,120
Speaker 1: operate in order to bring this kind of information back

828
00:50:21,120 --> 00:50:23,719
Speaker 1: to us and the kind of scientists who study this

829
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:25,920
Speaker 1: sort of stuff. But that will have to wait for

830
00:50:25,960 --> 00:50:28,520
Speaker 1: the next episode, or at least a future episode. I

831
00:50:28,560 --> 00:50:30,160
Speaker 1: don't know that it will be the next one, but

832
00:50:30,200 --> 00:50:33,680
Speaker 1: we'll see. And in the meantime, if you have suggestions

833
00:50:33,719 --> 00:50:36,440
Speaker 1: for things I should tackle in episodes of tech Stuff,

834
00:50:36,520 --> 00:50:38,920
Speaker 1: let me know. Reach out to me on Twitter. They

835
00:50:39,000 --> 00:50:42,080
Speaker 1: handle for the show is tech Stuff H s W

836
00:50:42,719 --> 00:50:50,600
Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you again really soon. Text Stuff

837
00:50:50,680 --> 00:50:53,799
Speaker 1: is an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from

838
00:50:53,840 --> 00:50:57,640
Speaker 1: my heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

839
00:50:57,760 --> 00:51:01,600
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Ye