JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE LAUNCHED WITH IBERESPACIO (ARQUIMEA at the present) THERMAL HARDWARE

The most powerful telescope ever manufactured, the James Webb Space Telescope, has been successfully launched from Kourou on board an Ariane 5, on December 25, 2021. The JWST, developed by the NASA with participation of the ESA and the CSA, will conduct infrared astronomy that will allow to view objects that, up to now, where too old, distant, and faint. This is expected to enable a broad range of investigations across the fields of astronomy and cosmology, such as observations of first stars and the formation of the first galaxies. Also, it will perform detailed atmospheric characterization of potentially habitable exoplanets in order to evaluate they mass, density, composition and formation.

IberEspacio (ARQUIMEA at present) has contributed to the mission with the manufacture of cryogenic single layer insulations covers that are part of the thermal control system of the Near InfraRed Spectrograph (NIRSpec instrument). A contribution of Europe to the mission that will provide deeper insights of the universe’s evolution.