James Webb Space Telescope tagged posts

Hubble took this photo of Mars when the planet was 50 million miles from Earth, during its last opposition in 2016. The photo reveals details as small as 20 to 30 miles across. Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), J. Bell (ASU), and M. Wolff (Space Science Institute)

Webb will investigate how Mars went from wet to dry. Mars rovers and orbiters have found signs that Mars once hosted liquid water on its surface. Much of that water escaped over time. How much water was lost, and how does the water that’s left move from ice to atmosphere to soil? During its first year of operations, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope will seek answers. Webb also will study mysterious methane plumes that hint at possible geological or even biological activity.

Mars will be targeted as pa...

Future telescopes like the James Webb Space Telescope (right) will observe the atmospheres of distant planets to seek evidence of life. Earth (top left) has several gases in its atmosphere that reveal the presence of life, primarily oxygen and ozone. The new study finds that for the early Earth (bottom left), the combination of abundant methane and carbon dioxide would provide an alternative sign of life. Credit: NASA/Wikimedia Commons/Joshua Krissansen-Totton

A new study has found a simple approach to look for life that might be more promising than just looking for oxygen. As NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and other new giant telescopes come online they will need novel strategies to look for evidence of life on other planets...

Artist’s conception of a brown dwarf, featuring the cloudy atmosphere of a planet and the residual light of an almost-star. Credit: NASA/ESA/JPL

Astronomers are hopeful that the powerful infrared capability of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope will resolve a puzzle as fundamental as stargazing itself – what IS that dim light in the sky? Brown dwarfs muddy a clear distinction between stars and planets, throwing established understanding of those bodies, and theories of their formation, into question.

Several research teams will use Webb to explore the mysterious nature of brown dwarfs, looking for insight into both star formation and exoplanet atmospheres, and the hazy territory in-between where the brown dwarf itself exists...

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field is a snapshot of about 10,000 galaxies in a tiny patch of sky, taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Beckwith (STScI), the HUDF Team

Scientists will use NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to study sections of the sky previously observed by NASA’s Great Observatories, including the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope, to understand the creation of the universe’s first galaxies and stars. After it launches and is fully commissioned, scientists plan to focus Webb telescope on sections of the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field (HUDF) and the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS)...