Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Space
  3. News

Here’s what the James Webb Space Telescope will study in its first year

By
Artist's impression of the James Webb Space Telescope
Artist’s impression of the James Webb Space Telescope ESA/ATG medialab

The Hubble Space Telescope is a beloved scientific institution, but at more than 20 years old it’s getting rather long in the tooth. That’s why NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) are joining forces to create the James Webb Space Telescope, a cutting-edge astronomy instrument that is set to launch later this year.

The instruments on board James Webb will enable science discoveries beyond anything possible right now, such as looking at exoplanets to see if they have atmospheres and whether any might be like Earth.

Recommended Videos

But exoplanet atmospheres aren’t the only topic that Webb will be researching. This week, NASA officials have announced the roster of scientific programs which the telescope will study in its first year. This includes programs to research how stars are formed, research into the climate and composition of bodies like planets and comets within our own solar system, and even programs to study the formation of the universe itself by looking for the earliest galaxies.

Related

“The initial year of Webb’s observations will provide the first opportunity for a diverse range of scientists around the world to observe particular targets with NASA’s next great space observatory,” said Dr. Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA in a statement. “The amazing science that will be shared with the global community will be audacious and profound.”

All of these programs will be a part of Cycle 1, which is the name for the first year of the telescope’s science operations. In total 266 proposals were selected from a highly competitive pool of thousands, as many more researchers would like time on the telescope than is available. The committee in charge of the selection had to whittle down the proposals to the most scientifically valuable, and they ended up awarding 6,000 hours of time on the telescope to the various projects.

“We are opening the infrared treasure chest, and surprises are guaranteed,” said Dr. John C. Mather, Senior Project Scientist for the Webb mission and Senior Astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “How did the universe make galaxies, stars, black holes, and planets, and our own very special little Earth? I don’t know yet, but we are getting closer every day.”

You can see a full list of all the programs planned for Webb’s first year of operations here.

Editors’ Recommendations

Topics
Georgina Torbet
Georgina Torbet
Space Writer
Georgina is the Digital Trends space writer, covering human space exploration, planetary science, and cosmology. She…
Webb captures a Penguin and an Egg for its two-year anniversary
This “penguin party” is loud! The distorted spiral galaxy at center, the Penguin, and the compact elliptical galaxy at left, the Egg, are locked in an active embrace. A new near- and mid-infrared image from the James Webb Space Telescope, taken to mark its second year of science, shows that their interaction is marked by a faint upside-down U-shaped blue glow.

This “penguin party” is loud! The distorted spiral galaxy at center, called the Penguin, and the compact elliptical galaxy at left, called the Egg, are locked in an active embrace. A new near- and mid-infrared image from the James Webb Space Telescope, taken to mark its second year of science, shows that their interaction is marked by a faint upside-down U-shaped blue glow. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Today, July 12, marks two years since the first images from the James Webb Space Telescope were unveiled. In that time, Webb has discovered the most distant galaxies known, uncovered surprises about the early universe, peered into the atmospheres of distant planets, and produced a plethora of beautiful images of space.

Read more
James Webb snaps a colorful image of a star in the process of forming
L1527, shown in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument), is a molecular cloud that harbors a protostar. It resides about 460 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. The more diffuse blue light and the filamentary structures in the image come from organic compounds known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), while the red at the center of this image is an energized, thick layer of gases and dust that surrounds the protostar. The region in between, which shows up in white, is a mixture of PAHs, ionized gas, and other molecules.

L1527, shown in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument), is a molecular cloud that harbors a protostar. It resides about 460 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

A stunning new image from the James Webb Space Telescope shows a young star called a protostar and the huge outflows of dust and gas that are thrown out as it consumes material from its surrounding cloud. This object has now been observed using two of Webb's instruments: a previous version that was taken in the near-infrared with Webb's NIRCam camera, and new data in the mid-infrared taken with Webb's MIRI instrument.

Read more
See a stunning 3D visualization of astronomy’s most beautiful object
This image is a mosaic of visible-light and infrared-light views of the same frame from the Pillars of Creation visualization. The three-dimensional model of the pillars created for the visualization sequence is alternately shown in the Hubble Space Telescope version (visible light) and the Webb Space Telescope version (infrared light).

This image is a mosaic of visible-light and infrared-light views of the same frame from the Pillars of Creation visualization. The three-dimensional model of the pillars created for the visualization sequence is alternately shown in the Hubble Space Telescope version (visible light) and the Webb Space Telescope version (infrared light). Greg Bacon (STScI), Ralf Crawford (STScI), Joseph DePasquale (STScI), Leah Hustak (STScI), Christian Nieves (STScI), Joseph Olmsted (STScI), Alyssa Pagan (STScI), Frank Summers (STScI), NASA's Universe of Learning

The Pillars of Creation are perhaps the most famous object in all of astronomy. Part of the Eagle Nebula, this vista was first captured by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995, and has captivated the public ever since with its dramatic rising pillars of dust and gas that stretch several light-years high. The nebula has been imaged often since then, including again by Hubble in 2014 and more recently by the James Webb Space Telescope in 2022.

Read more