Update:

How Cold Can You Go? Cooler Tested for NASA Telescope

A first-of-its-kind cooler for NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled to launch in 2018, has completed testing at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

About the size of a household fridge, this cooler has a far more important role than chilling sodas and snacks. It is key to catching faint whispers of light from the very first stars born in our universe billions of years ago. The cooler will chill one of the Webb telescope's four instruments, called the Mid-Infrared Instrument, or MIRI, which will also study other stars, exoplanets and galaxies.

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Update:

The Complex Material Engineering of NASA's Webb Telescope Sunshield

NASA and its industry partners developed a lightweight, robust way to protect the telescope and mirrors from the sun’s infrared radiation in the material that makes up the sunshield. Some of the things that make the sunshield unique are its strong yet ultra-thin material, special kite-like shape, and the special role of its layers.

Click link to view photographs.

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Update:

NASA Seeks Picometer Accuracy

With NASA funding, a team of scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, has begun working with an Arizona-based company to develop a highly sophisticated laboratory tool — a high-speed interferometer — capable of assuring picometer-level stability, a feat not yet accomplished.

Once it launches in October 2018. From its orbit 930,000 miles from Earth, it will study every phase in the history of our universe, from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang to the evolution of our own solar system. Among many other firsts, Webb will carry a 21-foot primary mirror made of 18 separate ultra-lightweight beryllium segments that unfold and adjust to shape after launch.

Click link to view photograph.

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Recent accomplishments, updated July 26th:

http://jwst.nasa.gov/recentaccomplish.html

Start Thermal Pathfinder test at JSC Chamber A: Delayed to September because of change to how Chamber A cool down specifics will be handled

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Update on JWST website concerning Proxima b:

"This is really a game-changer in our field," said Olivier Guyon, a planet-hunting affiliate at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, and associate professor at the University of Arizona, Tucson. "The closest star to us has a possible rocky planet in the habitable zone. That's a huge deal. It also boosts the already existing, mounting body of evidence that such planets are near, and that several of them are probably sitting quite close to us. This is extremely exciting."

Click link to view an artist impression of the surface of the newly found planet.

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Updates:

A Mechanical Harmony to NASA's Webb Telescope Sunshield

Like a car, many mechanical pieces in the Webb telescope's sunshield will work together to open it from its stored folded position in the rocket that will carry it into space.

The sunshield support structure contains well over 7,000 flight parts, including springs, bearings, pulleys, magnets, etc. In addition, the sunshield has hundreds of custom fabricated pieces. Most mechanical pieces were developed exclusively for the sunshield, with a few from existing designs.

Testing the James Webb Space Telescope Pathfinder

The James Webb Space Telescope Pathfinder structure has been configured for the Thermal Pathfinder Test at NASA Johnson Space Center's giant thermal vacuum chamber, called Chamber A. The Pathfinder is a test version of the structure that supports the telescope. This is where end-to-end testing of the actual telescope will occur in 2017.

Click links to view video and photographs.

*anxiously waiting for 2018*

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I think today they have officially declared assembly of the telescope as complete, and are now off to the testing and fine-tuning phase. There's a 40 minute news conference on the NASA YouTube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWeg88PTg4s

I think today they have officially declared assembly of the telescope as complete, and are now off to the testing and fine-tuning phase. There's a 40 minute news conference on the NASA YouTube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWeg88PTg4s

Great news!

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So looking forward to october 2018! I believe the JWST will turn out to be a new world wonder..

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The JWST has ended its 100 days stay in the cryogenic chamber A at Houston and will be transferred to Grumman-Northrop in California for final assembly on the launch vector. So far everything seems OK.
Tullio

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How is this big fragile piece of technology going to be delivered to the launching site?

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The mind is a weird and mysterious place

How is this big fragile piece of technology going to be delivered to the launching site?

https://asd.gsfc.nasa.gov/blueshift/index.php/2015/04/06/jwsts-pathfinder-on-the-movie/

So how much of it will be disassembled for the final journey to the launch pad? How many shipping containers/airplanes will be necessary? Then, once reassembled, I suppose it'll be in a compacted state until it reaches wherever it's desired location is in outer space, and then it'll unfurl like a really wild origami puzzle, I imagine.

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The mind is a weird and mysterious place

I think its destination is a Lagrange point.
Tullio

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L2 from what I could gather

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The JWST has ended its 100 days stay in the cryogenic chamber A at Houston and will be transferred to Grumman-Northrop in California for final assembly on the launch vector. So far everything seems OK.
Tullio

Thanx for the update, Tullio!

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I'll bet they are really giving this telescope a thorough going over before launch to insure nothing like what happened to the Hubble telescope occurs.

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Bob DeWoody

My motto: Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow as it may not be required. This no longer applies in light of current events.

I bet you're right, Bob. Hope so, anyway.

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Latest news

The launch of the telescope has been postponed till spring of 2019 : http://spacenews.com/jwst-launch-slips-to-2019/

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It has landed in Los Angeles on a C5A cargo plane. Now the two parts will be joined together and tested again. They are proceeding slowly and cautiously.
Tullio

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