Last Christmas, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was launched into space. The Webb Telescope is the next-generation space telescope that succeeds the Hubble Telescope, which was launched for the first time in 1990. It was developed by NASA, European Space Agency (ESA), and Canadian Space Agency (CSA) with an investment of 10 billion dollars (regarding 12.54 trillion won) for regarding 22 years since 1996.
About five months following launch, Webb Telescope finally made its first observation target. According to CNet, an IT professional media on the 26th local time, NASA selected the super-Earth planets ’55 Cancri e’ and ‘LHS 3844 b’ as the first observation objects of the Web telescope on this day. A super-Earth is a planet with a larger mass than Earth and the possibility of life.
55 Cancri e is the planet whose light was first detected in 2012. It is said to be twice the diameter and eight times the mass of the Earth. It was called super-Earth because it was larger than Earth and made of rock.
However, since the planet’s surface temperature is observed to be around 1000-2700°C, the possibility of life being present is slim. “55 Cancrie has a thick atmosphere dominated by oxygen and nitrogen,” said Renyu Hu, a team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Webb’s second target, LHS 3844 b, was discovered relatively recently. The planet, first discovered by NASA’s space telescope ‘TESS’ in April 2018, is located 49 light-years away. It has a mass 2.25 times greater than that of Earth, and has a surface temperature lower than 55 Cancrie. The researchers plan to capture the planet’s heat emission spectrum using the Webb Telescope’s Mid-Infrared Instrumentation (MIRI) and determine its composition.
There is a lot of anticipation for the observation work of the Webb telescope. “These planets will provide a fantastic, new perspective on Earth-like planets,” said Laura Craigberg of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy. will be,” he said.
I am very much looking forward to the results of this study as it proceeds smoothly.
Source = Media Bamboo
Arrangement = Reporter Hyungi Kim khk@techm.kr