The seven-phase project is expected to take three months.
, which has been circling Earth since April 1990. Whereas Hubble views the cosmos primarily in visible and ultraviolet light, however, the newly launched scope will focus on the infrared — wavelengths that we feel as heat.
Webb's optics and four science instruments must stay very cold to do this work; the slightest heat emissions could swamp the faint signals the observatory was designed to study. So Webb sports a huge, five-layer sunshield to block and disperse solar radiation and is ensconced at the, a gravitationally stable spot 930,000 miles from our planet that will allow Webb to use that shield effectively all the time.
Alignment isn't the final step in Webb's journey to operational status; the mission team will also need to commission the telescope's four science instruments. That work is expected to be complete by late June or early July, team members have said, at which point Webb will start its highly anticipated science mission.
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