NameJames Webb Space Telescope (JWST)Operational DateDecember 25, 2021 – PresentDescription
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is NASA’s infrared flagship observatory. JWST is an international collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). It orbits the Sun 1.5 million kilometers away from the Earth at the second Lagrange point.
Following on the technical and scientific legacy of previous optical and infrared space observatories, such as Hubble, Spitzer, and Herschel, JWST offers orders of magnitude improvements in sensitivity and spatial resolution from 0.6 to 28.8 micron, enabling transformative research in a broad range of science areas, including the solar system, exoplanets, star- and planet-formation, galactic science, galaxy formation and evolution, and cosmology.
The development of the observatory was managed by the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, and the main industrial partner was Northrop Grumman. Webb launched on December 25th, 2021.