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The spacex eagle heavy rocket was transported to the 39a launch pad at the kennedy space center on friday night
Five things you need to know about the roman space telescope
This is actually a modified spy satellite used to scan the sky。
The two mirrors of the telescope were originally prepared for the next generation of spy satellites of the national reconnaissance agency of the united states, but when the project was cancelled they were provided to the national aeronautics and space administration (nasa). After many years of consideration, nasa included them in its observatory programme, which was initially called the wide area infrared survey telescope (wfirst)。
The roman space telescope is named after nancy grace roman, the first chief astronomer of nasa, who is the first woman to hold a senior leadership position in the agency. It was roman who advocated the construction of telescopes in space, which eventually led to the birth of the hubble space telescope. Roman passed away in 2018 and won the reputation of the mother of hubble。
It has the same insight and wider vision as the hubble telescope。
The hubble telescope and the james webb space telescope aim to observe remote phenomena in the universe at close range, while the roman telescope focuses on a larger view of the universe. Its main instrument — the wide area viewer (wfi) — will take images of the universe's hyper-wide angles and capture the super-high-level view of the sky. It had also been equipped with its first active coronation for space, which would completely alter the research of outer planets。
The hubble space telescope has returned approximately 172 tb data over 30 years, while the roman telescope will transmit amazing 2,500 tb data during its five-year major mission。
In other words, the sensitive wide-angle camera and advanced detector of the roman telescope will scan large areas of the universe 1,000 times faster than the hubble telescope, and the amount of data collected within a month is equal to the amount that its older brother hubble telescope could have collected in a century。
On 30 august 2026, nasa's roman space telescope was deorbited after the successful launch of spacex falcon heavy rockets. The large disk antenna visible on the spacecraft is its high-benefit antenna, which will send back hundreds of billions of pixels to earth. (source: nasa)
The high-benefit antenna of the telescope is expected to transmit scientific data from 1. 4 tb to earth daily. This is by far the highest rate of data transmission in all nasa astrophysics missions. Roman's biggest image will contain 1 trillion pixels. It is worth mentioning that nasa has also set up a system to allow fans to “claim” pixels from the first images。
It will explore the dark secrets of the universe。
The ability of the roman space telescope to observe large skies will help scientists to uncover the mystery of dark matter and dark energy. Dark substances are an invisible substance, accounting for about 27 per cent of the mass energy of the universe, while visible substances account for less than 5 per cent. The roman telescope will study how light is bent by the gravitational force of dark matter, thus revealing its distribution and nature。
Dark energy, which accounts for about 68 per cent of the total amount of cosmic matter, is itself a deeper mystery. Data from this telescope should reveal how the effects of dark energy have changed over billions of years. Roman observations may also help astronomers to resolve what appears to be a contradiction in the age estimates of the universe — a scientific dilemma called “haber tension”。
This will expand the search for earth-like planets。
The roman space telescope is equipped with a new generation of coronators — a system of masks, prisms, detectors and self-reflectors designed to block the dazzling of distant stars. Nasa indicated that the active coronation of the roman telescope could detect 100 million less planets than its stars。
Romans should be able to directly capture a star-light image of a planet of the same size, temperature and distance from the parent star as jupiter. This sensitivity will be 100 to 1,000 times more sensitive than the existing space corona。
The system will pave the way for a world-friendly observatory (habitable worlds observatoire), the first telescope dedicated to finding signs of life on outer planets。
The coronation works to block the light of distant stars, enabling scientists to observe the tiny details around them. This means they can map the distribution of extraterrestrial planets around these stars. Once operational, the roman wide-area instrument (wfi) will collect more than 1 tb per day; its largest survey will take more than a year to complete and is expected to cover more than 500,000 4k televisions。
Its mission has just begun。
In the next three months, the roman space telescope will conduct a series of calibrations and tests as it approaches l2 at lagrand point. Once nasa completes the commissioning of the telescope, scientific observations will be officially launched. The first scientific images are expected to be released in early 2027。
Roman science plans will operate in synergy with other telescopes, including the hubble space telescope, the james webb space telescope, the european space agency's euclid space telescope and the vera rubin observatory in chile。
Its main task is planned to run for five years and a five-year extension has been planned. I don't know what happens after that. After all, the hubble telescope, whose original mission was planned to last for 15 years, still functioned well 36 years after its launch。
# astroscope # nasa # roman telescope # empty astronomy province
