The James Webb Space Telescope: The History of the Most Powerful Telescope in Space

On April 24, 1990, the Space Shuttle Discovery lifted off from Kennedy Space Center on the Space Shuttle Program’s 35th mission, but this was no ordinary mission. In its payload bay, Discovery was carrying the Hubble Space Telescope, with the objective of putting the telescope into orbit. The Hubble telescope, working in space less than 400 miles above the Earth’s surface, produced photos of galaxies previously unseen as they existed only 500 million years before the “Big Bang.” It was fortuitous that Hubble outlived its anticipated lifespan by many years, because the launch of its successor, the James Webb Space Telescope, was delayed by 15 years.

Several new obstacles delayed the launch, but NASA believed that it was finally prepared to proceed in 2020 after completion of construction four years prior. Then came the COVID pandemic, and 2020 became the year of “delayed events,” with the launch of the most sophisticated space telescope in history proving to be no exception.

The increase in excitement was palpable. Scientists had viewed much of the universe through Hubble, almost as it was when it was formed, but they learned that none of these galaxies were the first ones formed. Then ultimately realized that “Hubble wasn’t the right instrument to detect those first galaxies.” “The farther we can see in space, the farther we can see in time…and that’s not a metaphor. That’s actually literally true,” explained scientist Amber Straughn. The Webb Space Telescope represents “looking in a part of space that we’ve never seen before.” The telescope will be able to detect the earliest galaxies because of its unparalleled sensitivity. Another factor is the kind of light it will collect, “light that our eyes aren’t designed to see.”

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