New telescope after James Webb!!
Written by: Shakir Ullah
Meet NASA's futuristic space telescope called the "Nancy Grace Roman Telescope" named after a woman scientist,
Who was Dr. Nancy Gracey?
Dr. Nancy was NASA's Chief of Astronomy in the early 60s.
Finding Exoplanets through Chronographic Masking
she was the first scientist to propose that through a special technique called chronographic masking, planets orbiting other stars, which we call exoplanets, could be detected or seen with a space telescope. In the same way that you see something in the sky by making a small platform of your hand on your forehead in the bright sun, which is visible because you block most of the sunlight with your hand, so your eyes are less bright.
Dr. Nancy said that by attaching a chronograph mask to the telescope and blocking the light coming from the stars, planets less bright than the star can be seen around it. This technology is used today in both the Hubble and James Webb telescopes.
Like the James Webb Telescope, which will be launched in May 2027, the new telescope will observe the universe in infrared light. Infrared is light that cannot be seen by the normal eye. And that requires special detectors like you see in infrared cameras.
Launch of
Launch of Nancy Grace Roman Telescope
Like the James Webb Telescope, it will be launched into orbit at Longridge Point 2, several hundred thousand kilometers from Earth.
Why telescope will be placed in Longridge 2?
This is the place in space where the telescope's orbit will remain stable due to the balance of gravity between the Sun and the Earth.
Mirror comparison of Nancy Telescope and Jemz web 🕸 space telescope 🔭 :
The telescope's cosmic mirror will be about three times smaller than James Webb's mirror at 2.4 meters, the same size as the Hubble telescope's mirror. But it will be able to take pictures at a time in a wider area than Hubble, i.e. its field of view will be more than Hubble.
Camera on Nancy Grace Roman Telescope :
The new and advanced telescope will be equipped with a 300.8-megapixel camera that will capture highly detailed images of galaxies and stars, as well as a chronograph that will block most of the light from stars and Earth-like planets orbiting them. will find the spectrometer in it, a scientific instrument that will analyze the dim lights passing through the atmosphere of the planets, and will tell which of the discovered planets may have life.
Elon Musk's Role in Nancy Grace Space Telescope:
This telescope will be sent into space by Elon Musk's company SpaceX through its rocket in 2027.
The objective of Nancy Grace Roman Telescope :
One of the two main scientific objectives of this telescope is to obtain information about dark energy ⚡.
the other is to search for planets in the universe that are similar to Earth or where there are signs of life.
The telescope will be built to operate from 2027 to 2032, a leap year. And in the meantime, it will increase human knowledge as well as help scientists unlock many important mysteries of the universe.