Data From Infrared Telescope Exceeds Expectations

Uosdwis writes "It's just Day 10 for the Space Infrared Telescope Facility, and it is producing data! This is only a calibration image, but look at this data set. "We're extremely pleased, because these first images have exceeded our expectations," said Dr. Michael Werner. This data is from IRAC at the shorter wavelengths as the telescope is still cooling. The official press release here."

Comments

Why Infrared?

[Lacertus]

Anyone care to enlighten a novice astromomer in the benefits of using infrared in telescopic technology?

There quite a decent summary contained within the sirtf site: Why IR?

I'm excited to see the value and quality of images such a thing can produce.

Re:Why Infrared?

[Spamalamadingdong]

It's infrared because too much of the universe's interesting phenomena are either behind dust clouds or at extreme red shifts; this puts most or all of their detectable emissions in the infrared, and we can't learn much about them unless we go looking there.

Had to say it...

[Pilferer]

My god, it's full of stars!

Triangle shaped

[Frans Faase]

It seems to me that all the stars look kind of triangle shaped. Because starts are not triangles, it looks like the error is from the optics or the detector slid. I hope it is not some kind of systematic error such as the Hubble telescope had.

Re:Triangle shaped

[Zachary Kessin]

I'm just guessing here, but I would bet it is a function of the mapping from the original data to much lower resolution they posted on the web.

If you look at the high res image much of that goes away. Also note this is a camera working at the very limits of what people can design.

Re:Triangle shaped

[PD]

Here's the quote from the article about that:

The images were taken as part of an operational test of the infrared array camera. It will take about a month to fully focus and fine-tune the telescope and cool it to optimal operating temperature, so these early images will not be as sharp or polished as future pictures.

All that trouble...

[Ignis Flatus]

just to find out that the Universe is warm and fuzzy.

Re:All that trouble...

[Rheingold]

And beige!

Artifacts

[msheppard]

The triangle shapes are probably an artifact of the sensors. Similar to the lines you see eminating from stars in other telescopes, caused by the hardware of the scope.

I think it's a pretty far leap to compare something liket his which you don't understand to the problems hubble had, which I also bet you didn't understand (they were not "systemic")

The Purpose of IR Astronomy

[Uosdwis]

For those of you who took 'physics' this should be old hat.

There are many different wavelengths of light. Visible light is a very narrow band of the whole light spectrum. Other radiation (X, gamma, UV, IR) work in different parts of the spectrum, but is still light. Everyone likes the Hubble because it can give us pretty pictures, and truly they are amazing & has made many ground breaking discoveries, but IR can show us much much more.

Why? Because you make a better door than window Einstein. Interstellar space has tons and tons of dirt, which the Hubble can't see through with visible light. IR on the other hand is radiated through it. Just look how different the universe is when observed from a different point of view. Orion is amazingly different when looked at with IR compared with the visible spectrum. The composition, it's purpose and function is vastly different in IR to 'shed some more light' on things we 'already know'.

And for you cynics, much of this data will be given straight to the community at large, making it truly a public endeavor.

Re:The Purpose of IR Astronomy

[snake_dad]

Everyone likes the Hubble because it can give us pretty pictures, and truly they are amazing & has made many ground breaking discoveries, but IR can show us much much more.

It's not just visible light that gives beautiful pictures. Check out this gallery of Chandra X-ray images.

(OT) Spelling 'Iraq', 'Irak', 'Irac', 'Uruk', etc.

[yerricde]

Some countries officially spell the name of that country next to Kuwait differently.

For example, the UNITED STATES CORPORATION (distinct from the united states of America) spells it "New Texas."

It's a rough ride to orbit

[Spamalamadingdong]

why would you need an active focusing mirror when there's no atmosphere and the targets are all at infinity???

Because the spacecraft gets jostled and buffetted a lot on the way up, and things aren't always in the same relationship at the end of the trip as they were on the ground. Little things like the absence of gravity influence things too. Being able to tweak stuff after launch is probably a lot cheaper and more reliable than building everything heavy enough to be exactly the same before and after.