The Golden Honeycomb in Space

Exploring the James Webb Space Telescope: Part 1

A communicator's exploration of NASA's new space telescope 1 million miles away.

A few weeks ago, NASA released new images from the James Webb Space Telescope in a large live stream extravaganza across a number of NASA research facilities around the United States - complete with tune in viewing parties around the world. A perceptible excitement hung in the air from those of us who have watched this telescope since before its launch last year.

When we found out about the surprise press conference unveiling the very first image from this high powered telescope, one of my coworkers set things up to display the live press conference on the large television set over the main entrance to the building. We all gathered around like elementary students gathering for recess, some in small groups while others lined up to face the large TV on the wall. Guests noticed the excitement and even gathered around to watch the new astronomical history unfold.

Image courtesy of webbtelescope.org

Full disclosure - through work, I became more aware of the James Webb Space Telescope last year in 2021, unlike the hundreds of people that have been working on it for over a decade. Though, it is still a very exciting prospect in space exploration, whether you are a scientist or just a fan. The sales of the James Webb golden mirrors on everything from coffee mugs to t-shirts can attest to this. As part of my job, I had to give a short live presentation about the telescope to guests, which came with a steep learning curve - not only did I have to learn the updated information but also be prepared to answer any question that came my way.

So then what is a telescope?

First off, the modern telescopes that we are so familiar with have been around for centuries - since the early 1600's with scientists utilizing lenses to see far distances first on Earth by simply looking around them and then up at the night sky. Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei was one of the first known scientists to do such a thing and document his findings extensively....which landed him in front of the Holy Roman Inquisition...not to be confused with the Spanish Inquisition which no one ever expects.

If you want to know more about Galileo himself, I've added a link to a nice Youtube biography of him here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eMYZCnNALc

This first telescope was made with a convex and a concave lens put inside of a long tube where you hold it up to your eye, point the tube what what you wanted to look at, and then put your eye up to the other end. Hopefully no one put ink on the small end when you hold it up. This miraculous tool has also been used over the centuries for more than looking up at the stars. Anyone who needs to look over long distances has utilized a version of this in some fashion. Even binoculars stem from the first attempted patent of the telescope. I don't know about you, but I remember taking empty paper towel rolls and turning them into make believe telescopes while playing sailors, pirates, and even the occasional Peter Pan spying on Captain Hook.

A concave lens is curved inward toward the glass while a convex lens is curved outward like in the image below. A quick example of this can easily be seen on a pair of glasses or a magnifying lens. I'm sure you could find other examples around your house.

Essentially, you take at least 1 pair of these lenses and place them inside the tube to create the telescope so you can see far away objects appear larger or up close. I'm reminded of the Little Mermaid when Scuttle holds up the telescope backwards so he thinks Ariel is very far away, but she is actually right in front of him. Don't do this, unless you want to confuse yourself.

So then what is a space telescope?

On an initial Google search, simply typing in 'space telescope' will get you information about specific telescopes that you may or may not have heard of. Which is great, but I'm looking for the definition. So let's get to the basics.

"U.S. Aerospace. a 7.9-foot (2.4-meter) optical telescope designed for use in orbit around the earth." - Dictionary.com

"a satellite put in orbit around the earth and equipped with an extremelyaccuratereflectingtelescope, cameras, etc.: it is designed to relayastronomicaldata to the earth" - Collins Dictionary

"A space telescope or space observatory is a telescope located in outer space to observe distant planets, galaxies and other astronomical objects. Space telescopes avoid the filtering of ultraviolet frequencies, X-rays and gamma rays; the distortion (scintillation) of electromagnetic radiation; as well as light pollution which ground-based observatories encounter. Suggested by Lyman Spitzer in 1946, the first operational space telescopes were the American Orbiting Astronomical Observatory, OAO-2 launched in 1968, and the Soviet Orion 1 ultraviolet telescope aboard space station Salyut 1 in 1971. Space telescopes are distinct from Earth imaging satellites, that point toward Earth for satellite imaging, applied for espionage, weather analysis and other types of information gathering. Space observatories are divided into two types: Astronomical survey satellites to map the entire sky, and satellites which focus on selected astronomical objects or parts of the sky and beyond." Dicitionary.net - - - quoted Wikipedia

After three sites, I finally got to something substantial that helps answer my own questions, which was, "Why put telescopes in space in the first place?" That answer arrived in a quote from a dictionary that quoted an open source encyclopedia. Perhaps I should have started with Wikipedia which has been my inkling to use as my starting point since it first published on the internet over 10 years ago.

Essentially we send telescopes to outer space to filter out things in the atmosphere and from the rest of the technology we have created that might disrupt the light being gathered into the telescope to create the images we need to study. Think of when you want to watch a movie at home, but you have a light on in the living room that creates a glared reflection on the screen.

Annoying right? You get an image, but its not as clear as if the lights were totally off like when you go to a movie theater (minus the emergency exit lights for safety.) This is also why companies are spending so much money to create television sets that removes the glare for you. Convenient! All the images and I don't have to get off the couch to turn off the lights, nor do I have to tell Alexa to do it for me.

Next Time - Hubble Bubble

Clearly there is a lot of information about there involving the history of telescopes, how they work on Earth, how they work in space, what kind of light they gather, what they even point at...

I'm going to get lost and overwhelmed if I don't break this up into manageable chunks. Don't want to choke to death on information. That would not be pretty.

Keep a look out for my next post into more of a deep dive on space telescopes, leading up to the James Webb including the Hubble Space Telescope, and the specific workings of telescopes themselves.