Looking up at the starry sky, the reason why we can see the beautiful universe depends entirely on powerful astronomical equipment, it is the Hubble Space Telescope, which brings us an unprecedented perspective, but with the growth of time, the Hubble Space Telescope no longer has the value of maintenance after many repairs.
But its successor has not yet appeared, and according to the International Astronomical Observatory, the James Webb Space Telescope developed by NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency is ready to be launched on October 31, 2021.
The James Webb Space Telescope, hereinafter referred to as JWST, is a new generation of infrared telescopes developed by human scientists, the latest estimate is as high as $9.66 billion, unlike the previous Hubble Space Telescope, JWST weighs only half of Hubble, about 6.2 tons, the main mirror is made of beryllium, the aperture reaches 6.5 meters, the area is more than 5 times that of the Hubble Space Telescope. It is the largest of today's space telescopes, so JWST is known as the heir to the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope.
Scientists said that JWST is a new generation of telescopes we developed, to know the emergence of Hubble telescope, changed our view of the universe, let us know how big the world is, and the launch of JWST, may update our understanding of the universe, JWST's main mission, is responsible for observing the microwave radiation left over from the Big Bang, from which to find clues and changes in the early universe.
JWST and hubble space telescope difference is that the Hubble space telescope is around the earth, so affected by the rotation of the earth, at a certain moment, it can not accurately lock a position, because the position back and forth changes, to the astronomers observations also have an impact, but jwst's launch orbit, not around the earth, but between the earth and the sun, 1.5 million kilometers from the earth, Lagrange point (l2) orbit, so that no matter how jwst operates, When observing neighboring celestial bodies, it can complete the observation task motionlessly.
And in the L2 orbit, JWST carries a high-tech blackout board, the purpose of which is to shield the light source that interferes with the signal. Unlike the Hubble Space Telescope, we've done many maintenance and repairs to hubbard since its launch, and replaced a lot of parts, but once jwst has a problem, then repair will be the biggest problem, perhaps almost impossible to complete the repair work.
That's why we've repeatedly postponed the launch of JWST from the earliest in 2007 to the modern one, with the latest launch scheduled for October 31, 2021, at the Space Center in Guyana, France, and lifted off on an Aryan V carrier rocket. JWST is very large, its main lens diameter is larger than the rocket itself, so it must be folded up, and then after the predetermined orbit, JWST will be unfolded, according to the simulation, jwst fully unfolded, it will take nearly three days.
JWST is called a new generation of space telescopes by human scientists, because its discovery is likely to explain some of the existing problems of the universe for us, and in other observations, its accuracy is also several times more than Hubble, so many scientists believe that JWST can bring us a new vision of the universe.
JWST was named after NASA's second director, James Webb, for the successful implementation of the famous Apollo manned lunar landing program in human history under his leadership. So NASA hopes that JWST may also enable us to discover new records that transcend history.