What You Need to Know About the James Webb Telescope

The massive JWST, as it's called, has been decades in the making and is scheduled to launch on Christmas Eve.

Jeremy Kariuki

Wednesday, December 15, 2021 at 02:28 PM ET

Verified

The JWST was conceptualized as the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope. Courtesy: NASA

Key Takeaways:

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is NASA's next-generation infrared observatory, designed to detect the universe's earliest stars and galaxies by capturing faint, redshifted light, effectively looking back in time.
It features a 6.6-meter gold-coated primary mirror array and a tennis-court-sized heat shield, operating at extremely cold temperatures at Lagrange Point 2 (L2), a million miles from Earth, to protect its sensitive instruments.
The JWST's launch and subsequent two-week unfolding process in space are critical, as its distant orbit at L2 means no in-space repairs will be possible if something goes wrong.

See a mistake? Contact us.

The world is on the brink of a new age of space exploration, thanks to the decades-long development of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Packed with cutting-edge technology, the massive telescope is set to launch next week.

But what makes the JWST so important? And why has it taken so long to produce? With those answers and more, here’s everything you need to know about the JWST.