The Prague Post - Webb telescope spots its first star -- and takes a selfie

EUR -
AED 4.177613
AFN 80.776958
ALL 98.674291
AMD 442.254844
ANG 2.049839
AOA 1041.815217
ARS 1325.015571
AUD 1.77753
AWG 2.050078
AZN 1.930861
BAM 1.954283
BBD 2.277932
BDT 138.142794
BGN 1.956115
BHD 0.428723
BIF 3381.475805
BMD 1.137352
BND 1.489844
BOB 7.855869
BRL 6.392603
BSD 1.136928
BTN 96.840421
BWP 15.522091
BYN 3.720713
BYR 22292.106206
BZD 2.283828
CAD 1.574386
CDF 3273.299627
CHF 0.936661
CLF 0.028029
CLP 1075.582507
CNY 8.267979
CNH 8.266601
COP 4773.467844
CRC 574.769111
CUC 1.137352
CUP 30.139837
CVE 110.179011
CZK 24.924961
DJF 202.462879
DKK 7.464893
DOP 66.999772
DZD 150.740411
EGP 57.771771
ERN 17.060285
ETB 152.189631
FJD 2.605106
FKP 0.849211
GBP 0.849329
GEL 3.121981
GGP 0.849211
GHS 16.258311
GIP 0.849211
GMD 81.322521
GNF 9847.271442
GTQ 8.756166
GYD 238.573806
HKD 8.823421
HNL 29.504363
HRK 7.53724
HTG 148.764551
HUF 404.313979
IDR 19017.555034
ILS 4.12516
IMP 0.849211
INR 96.949905
IQD 1489.444117
IRR 47882.534347
ISK 146.081688
JEP 0.849211
JMD 180.101815
JOD 0.806612
JPY 161.979428
KES 146.946635
KGS 99.461261
KHR 4551.427846
KMF 491.620598
KPW 1023.732863
KRW 1625.236725
KWD 0.348326
KYD 0.947465
KZT 581.578666
LAK 24591.915438
LBP 101870.04373
LKR 340.575696
LRD 227.392532
LSL 21.096928
LTL 3.358306
LVL 0.687973
LYD 6.220173
MAD 10.546369
MDL 19.566815
MGA 5131.063151
MKD 61.575461
MMK 2388.195606
MNT 4063.055995
MOP 9.08475
MRU 45.011465
MUR 51.407236
MVR 17.515996
MWK 1971.487361
MXN 22.252725
MYR 4.908247
MZN 72.801774
NAD 21.096928
NGN 1821.492028
NIO 41.837532
NOK 11.805172
NPR 154.949838
NZD 1.9184
OMR 0.437884
PAB 1.136913
PEN 4.168365
PGK 4.710324
PHP 63.575149
PKR 319.398439
PLN 4.267346
PYG 9104.934114
QAR 4.144765
RON 4.977848
RSD 117.109117
RUB 93.263383
RWF 1625.253012
SAR 4.266304
SBD 9.509741
SCR 16.177403
SDG 682.98601
SEK 10.969993
SGD 1.48723
SHP 0.89378
SLE 25.875339
SLL 23849.691791
SOS 649.801435
SRD 41.911684
STD 23540.897494
SVC 9.94828
SYP 14787.811104
SZL 21.089819
THB 38.01543
TJS 12.005819
TMT 3.992107
TND 3.400946
TOP 2.663793
TRY 43.778882
TTD 7.714014
TWD 36.458396
TZS 3059.478312
UAH 47.234259
UGX 4166.748076
USD 1.137352
UYU 47.871797
UZS 14721.575318
VES 98.435697
VND 29576.848055
VUV 137.968789
WST 3.15057
XAF 655.454098
XAG 0.034511
XAU 0.000344
XCD 3.073752
XDR 0.815175
XOF 655.448339
XPF 119.331742
YER 278.708486
ZAR 21.117949
ZMK 10237.534291
ZMW 31.806317
ZWL 366.226995
  • SCS

    0.1500

    10.01

    +1.5%

  • NGG

    0.1900

    73.04

    +0.26%

  • GSK

    0.9100

    38.97

    +2.34%

  • BTI

    0.4700

    42.86

    +1.1%

  • BCC

    -0.8300

    94.5

    -0.88%

  • CMSC

    -0.0800

    22.24

    -0.36%

  • RBGPF

    -0.4500

    63

    -0.71%

  • AZN

    1.7800

    71.71

    +2.48%

  • RIO

    0.0100

    60.88

    +0.02%

  • BP

    -1.0600

    28.07

    -3.78%

  • JRI

    0.1300

    12.93

    +1.01%

  • CMSD

    -0.1300

    22.35

    -0.58%

  • RYCEF

    -0.1300

    10.12

    -1.28%

  • BCE

    0.1100

    21.92

    +0.5%

  • RELX

    0.4300

    53.79

    +0.8%

  • VOD

    0.0100

    9.58

    +0.1%

Webb telescope spots its first star -- and takes a selfie
Webb telescope spots its first star -- and takes a selfie

Webb telescope spots its first star -- and takes a selfie

Star light, star bright, the James Webb Space Telescope has seen its first star (though it wasn't quite tonight) -- and even taken a selfie, NASA announced Friday.

Text size:

The steps are part of the months-long process of aligning the observatory's enormous golden mirror that astronomers hope will begin unraveling the mysteries of the early Universe by this summer.

The first picture sent back of the cosmos is far from stunning: 18 blurry white dots on a black background, all showing the same object: HD 84406 a bright, isolated star in the constellation Ursa Major.

But in fact it represents a major milestone. The 18 dots were captured by the primary mirror's 18 individual segments -- and the image is now the basis for aligning and focusing those hexagonal pieces.

The light bounced off the segments to Webb's secondary mirror, a round object located at the end of long booms, and then to the Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam) instrument -- Webb's main imaging device.

"The entire Webb team is ecstatic at how well the first steps of taking images and aligning the telescope are proceeding," said Marcia Rieke, principal investigator for the NIRCam instrument and regents professor of astronomy, University of Arizona, in a statement.

"We were so happy to see that light make its way into NIRCam."

The image capturing process began on February 2, with Webb pointing at different positions around the predicted location of the star.

Though Webb's initial search covered an area of the sky about equal to the size of the full Moon, the dots were all located near the center portion, meaning the observatory is already relatively well positioned for final alignment.

To aid the process, the team also captured a "selfie" taken not through an externally mounted camera but through a special lens on board NIRCam.

NASA had previously said a selfie wasn't possible, so the news comes as a welcome bonus for space fans.

"I think pretty much the reaction was holy cow," Lee Feinberg, Webb optical telescope element manager, told reporters in a call, explaining that the team wasn't sure it was possible to obtain such an image using starlight alone.

The $10 billion observatory launched from French Guiana on December 25 and is now in an orbit that is aligned with the Earth's around the Sun, one million miles (1.5 million kilometers away) from our planet, in a region of space called the second Lagrange point.

Webb will begin its science mission by summer, which includes using its high resolution instruments to peer back in time 13.5 billion years to the first generation of galaxies that formed after the Big Bang.

Visible and ultraviolet light emitted by the very first luminous objects has been stretched by the Universe's expansion, and arrives today in the form of infrared, which Webb is equipped to detect with unprecedented clarity.

Its mission also includes the study of distant planets, known as exoplanets, to determine their origin, evolution and habitability.

C.Novotny--TPP