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The Future of Astronomy: NASA's James Webb Space Telescope
An anonymous reader writes: In 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was launched and deployed, becoming the first space-based observatory. In the years since, many others have followed, covering the entire electromagnetic spectrum, but with nothing superseding Hubble over the wavelengths it covers. That will all change with the James Webb Space Telescope, currently on schedule and almost ready for its October 2018 launch date. The science instruments are all complete, the final mirrors are being inserted into the optical assembly, the sunshield (a new, innovative component) is almost complete, and then it just needs assembly and launch. When it's all said and done, JWST will be orders of magnitude greater than all the other observatories that came before, and will finally allow us to truly see the first stars, galaxies and quasars in the Universe, not limited by the obscuring neutral gas that currently blocks our view with other observatories.
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"In the years since, many others have followed, covering the entire electromagnetic spectrum, but with nothing superseding Hubble over the wavelengths it covers. That will all change with the James Webb Space Telescope, currently on schedule and almost ready for its October 2018 launch date."
This is not entirely accurate. JWST is primarily infrared- it won't cover the full visible spectrum. Hubble will still be required to see anything below yellow/green wavelengths, including blue down through ultraviolet, where JWST can't see at all. It will certainly let us see farther, and through the dust, but it's not the be all end all of space telescopes.
For Hubble someone forgot to account for change in shape of the lens due to gravity
No, the problem was caused by one of Perkin-Elmer's testing devices having been assembled incorrectly.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
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