James Webb Space Telescope

Webb is the premier observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It studies every phase in the history of our Universe.

active Mission
Illustration of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope

Webb studies every phase in the history of our Universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of solar systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System. Webb launched on Dec. 25th 2021. It does not orbit around the Earth like the Hubble Space Telescope, it orbits the Sun 1.5 million kilometers (1 million miles) away from the Earth at what is called the second Lagrange point or L2. 

Mission Type

Astrophysics

Partners

NASA/ESA/CSA

Launch

Dec 25, 2021

Arrival at L2

Jan 24, 2022

Key Facts

This image is from Webb’s NIRCam instrument, which saw this nebula in the near-infrared.

extending the tantalizing discoveries of the Hubble Space Telescope.

Engineers Prep James Webb Telescope for Integration

So big it has to fold origami-style to fit in the rocket and will unfold like a “Transformer” in space.

Webb Lagrange Points

Webb orbits the Sun 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth. (Hubble orbits 560 kilometers above the Earth.)

NASA’s Webb Sunshield Successfully Unfolds and Tensions in Final Tests

Webb has a 5-layer sunshield that protects the telescope from the infrared radiation of the Sun, Earth, and Moon; like having sun protection of SPF 1 million.

The image shows the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 as it appeared 4.6 billion years ago

iIt will peer back in time over 13.5 billion years to see the first galaxies born after the Big Bang.in the ISS.

Astronomers have long tried to track down how elements like carbon, which is essential for life, become widely distributed across the universe. Now, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has examined one ongoing source of carbon-rich dust in our own Milky Way galaxy in greater detail: Wolf-Rayet 140, a system of two massive stars that follow a tight, elongated orbit.

As they swing past one another (within the central white dot in the Webb images), the stellar winds from each star slam together, the material compresses, and carbon-rich dust forms. Webb’s latest observations show 17 dust shells shining in mid-infrared light that are expanding at regular intervals into the surrounding space.

A three-part graphic. The left and center images show two observations of Wolf-Rayet 140, from July 2022 at left and from September 2023 at center. Both show a bright white point of light surrounded by 17 regularly spaced, hazy dust shells at the bottom, right, and upper right. The panels each have an outline of a square overlaid toward the top right, which has a brighter white outline of a triangle. At left, the triangle points up and is labeled a. At right, the triangle points down and is labeled b. The third panel at right shows a magnified version of the areas outlined in the left and center panels. There are two labels. At top left, a, and at bottom right, b. It is very obvious that the arced orange shells do not perfectly match in the middle where they are spliced together. The arcs at left appear lower, and the arcs at right all appear higher. Each arc lines up for about half its width.
Two mid-infrared images from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope of Wolf-Rayet 140 show carbon-rich dust moving in space. At right, the two triangles from the main images are matched up to show how much difference 14 months makes: The dust is racing away from the central stars at almost 1% the speed of light. These stars are 5,000 light-years away in our own Milky Way galaxy.
Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI; Science: Emma Lieb (University of Denver), Ryan Lau (NSF NOIRLab), Jennifer Hoffman (University of Denver)

Latest News

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Latest 2024 Images

The image below is a SLIDESHOW. Hover over the image to see the image title and controls. Click the image to go to a detail page with more info and the ability to download the image at various resolutions (click downward arrow in lower right corner).

A close look at a local galaxy (NGC 2566)