The center section of the backplane structure that will fly on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has been completed, marking an important milestone in the telescope's hardware development.
By comparing infrared and X-ray background signals, team of astronomers has discovered evidence of a significant number of black holes that accompanied the first stars in the universe.
The European Space Agency (ESA) has selected three NASA-nominated science teams to participate in their planned Euclid mission, including one led by Goddard Space Flight Center.
Engineers working on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope met another milestone recently with they completed performance testing on the observatory's aft-optics subsystem.
Volume 9, Issue 5 - The thermal shield of the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) on JWST goes through rigorous environmental testing to ensure it can perform properly in the extreme cold temperatures that it will encounter in space.
Congratulations to Harvey Moseley!
02.27.2013
Please congratulate Harvey Moseley -- he is the recipient of the SPIE's 2013 George W. Goddard award!
The citation reads: "in recognition of his extraordinary inventions of
superconducting imaging arrays for astronomy, ranging from submillimeter
bolometers to energy sensitive x-ray microcalorimeters, and even dark matter
detectors, as well as microshutter arrays for the James Webb Space Telescope
near-IR spectrometer".
The Observational Cosmology Laboratory conducts research to improve understanding of the origin, evolution and ultimate fate of the universe. Specific issues under investigation include what powered the Big Bang; the size, shape, and matter-energy content of the universe; when the first stars and galaxies appeared and their evolution over cosmic time; and the nature of the mysterious dark energy that is driving the universe apart.
A comparison of all-sky image of temperature fluctuations in the early universe with COBE (upper image)
and the WMAP (lower image). Science operations for WMAP are conducted in the ASD (Bennett, PI)
