NASA drops update for James Webb Telescope, new milestone achieved

NASA's administrator has dropped a new update for the James Webb Space Telescope, celebrating yet another milestone achieved.

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The James Webb Space Telescope is not only nearing the end of its journey to Lagrange 2, it's also closing in on completing its deployment.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) took off from Earth on Christmas Day, 2021, and has now spent a full month in space. Webb has completed the majority of its complicated deployment work, which has taken the observatory from a narrow configuration that was necessary for launch to an extremely expensive unfolded piece of origami that will hopefully be able to answer some of the biggest questions about the universe.

JWST has 18 primary mirrors, and each is hexagonal and is controlled by seven actuators that give teams back on Earth precise movement capabilities. Teams began deploying each of the mirrors on January 12, and now according to NASA administrator Bill Nelson, all 18 mirror segments are now fully deployed. This doesn't mean that the observatory is operational, as Space.com points out, NASA will need to alter each of the positions of the mirrors, so all of the segments combine to form one giant mirror.

To find out where Webb is right now, check out this link here.

NASA drops update for James Webb Telescope, new milestone achieved 01
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NEWS SOURCE:space.com

Jak joined the TweakTown team in 2017 and has since reviewed 100s of new tech products and kept us informed daily on the latest science, space, and artificial intelligence news. Jak's love for science, space, and technology, and, more specifically, PC gaming, began at 10 years old. It was the day his dad showed him how to play Age of Empires on an old Compaq PC. Ever since that day, Jak fell in love with games and the progression of the technology industry in all its forms. Instead of typical FPS, Jak holds a very special spot in his heart for RTS games.

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