As Santa makes his way back to the North Pole in the early hours of Saturday morning, another extraordinary flight will be about to begin. The James Webb Space Telescope — "the most powerful observatory ever sent into space," and having the humble goal of uncovering "the secrets of the universe" — is scheduled to take off from a European-managed launchpad in French Guiana at 7:20 a.m. Eastern.
A joint project between NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency, the James Webb Space Telescope "will peer deeper into the cosmos — and farther back in time — to open a window on the universe as it took shape soon after the Big Bang," The Wall Street Journal explains. Though only roughly the size of a tennis court, the telescope is designed to detect light that was emitted 13.6 billion years ago, at the dawn of the universe — maybe up to as little as 100 million years after the Big Bang. Previously, the oldest galaxy astronomers have observed, using the 100-times-weaker Hubble Telescope, dates to around 400 million years after the Big Bang.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Zohran Mamdani: the young progressive likely to be New York City's next mayorIn The Spotlight The policies and experience that led to his meteoric rise
-
The best film reboots of all timeThe Week Recommends Creativity and imagination are often required to breathe fresh life into old material
-
'More must be done'Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
-
New York plans first nuclear plant in 36 yearsSpeed Read The plant, to be constructed somewhere in upstate New York, will produce enough energy to power a million homes
-
The treasure trove of platinum on the moonUnder the radar This kind of bounty could lead to commercial exploitation
-
Why Elon Musk's satellites are 'dropping like flies'Under The Radar Fierce solar activity destroying Starlink satellites
-
Dehorning rhinos sharply cuts poaching, study findsSpeed Read The painless procedure may be an effective way to reduce the widespread poaching of rhinoceroses
-
Why is Nasa facing a crisis?Today's Big Question Trump administration proposes 25% cut to national space agency's budget in 'extinction-level event'
-
Breakthrough gene-editing treatment saves babyspeed read KJ Muldoon was healed from a rare genetic condition
-
Full moon calendar: dates and times for every full moon this yearIn depth When to see the lunar phenomenon every month
-
Sea lion proves animals can keep a beatspeed read A sea lion named Ronan beat a group of college students in a rhythmic dance-off, says new study
