The James Webb Space Telescope is delivering dazzling images. Nearly 100 times the resolution of images from the great Hubble Space Telescope, they are providing a sensational look into the far reaches of our universe. How extraordinary that while life on our planet is descending into terrible darkness, we are being given our clearest and brightest glimpses ever into the heavens!
Hubble has inspired us for 30 years as it brought faraway galaxies home to Earth. The 1995 Hubble Deep Field exposure focused on about a 2-millionth section of the night sky in the constellation Ursa Major for 100 hours. The area was chosen because of how dark and empty it was. When the images appeared, astronomers were shocked. In that pinprick of space, they could count nearly 3,000 galaxies! The 2004 Ultra Deep Field image showed the farthest galaxies that are possible to see in the human-visible spectrum and led astronomers to estimate the total number of galaxies in the universe at 120 billion.
The James Webb telescope is even more complex, costly and risky than Hubble. After decades of delays and billions of dollars, it finally launched in late 2021. As it hurled through space at a mile per second, nasa administrator Bill Nelson pointed back in time and said: “A shepherd grazing his sheep would look up at the night sky. He became a poet. And he penned the words, The heavens declare the glory of God; the firmament shows his handiwork. That shepherd, that poet, became king. And those immortal words in Psalm 19 encapsulate the expressions that we have today—the handiwork of God—as we peer back in time, over 13 billion years ago, [and] capture the light from the very beginning of the creation.”
The James Webb Space Telescope is delivering dazzling images. Nearly 100 times the resolution of images from the great Hubble Space Telescope, they are providing a sensational look into the far reaches of our universe. How extraordinary that while life on our planet is descending into terrible darkness, we are being given our clearest and brightest glimpses ever into the heavens!
Hubble has inspired us for 30 years as it brought faraway galaxies home to Earth. The 1995 Hubble Deep Field exposure focused on about a 2-millionth section of the night sky in the constellation Ursa Major for 100 hours. The area was chosen because of how dark and empty it was. When the images appeared, astronomers were shocked. In that pinprick of space, they could count nearly 3,000 galaxies! The 2004 Ultra Deep Field image showed the farthest galaxies that are possible to see in the human-visible spectrum and led astronomers to estimate the total number of galaxies in the universe at 120 billion.
The James Webb telescope is even more complex, costly and risky than Hubble. After decades of delays and billions of dollars, it finally launched in late 2021. As it hurled through space at a mile per second, nasa administrator Bill Nelson pointed back in time and said: “A shepherd grazing his sheep would look up at the night sky. He became a poet. And he penned the words, The heavens declare the glory of God; the firmament shows his handiwork. That shepherd, that poet, became king. And those immortal words in Psalm 19 encapsulate the expressions that we have today—the handiwork of God—as we peer back in time, over 13 billion years ago, [and] capture the light from the very beginning of the creation.”
The James Webb Space Telescope is delivering dazzling images. Nearly 100 times the resolution of images from the great Hubble Space Telescope, they are providing a sensational look into the far reaches of our universe. How extraordinary that while life on our planet is descending into terrible darkness, we are being given our clearest and brightest glimpses ever into the heavens!
Hubble has inspired us for 30 years as it brought faraway galaxies home to Earth. The 1995 Hubble Deep Field exposure focused on about a 2-millionth section of the night sky in the constellation Ursa Major for 100 hours. The area was chosen because of how dark and empty it was. When the images appeared, astronomers were shocked. In that pinprick of space, they could count nearly 3,000 galaxies! The 2004 Ultra Deep Field image showed the farthest galaxies that are possible to see in the human-visible spectrum and led astronomers to estimate the total number of galaxies in the universe at 120 billion.
The James Webb telescope is even more complex, costly and risky than Hubble. After decades of delays and billions of dollars, it finally launched in late 2021. As it hurled through space at a mile per second, nasa administrator Bill Nelson pointed back in time and said: “A shepherd grazing his sheep would look up at the night sky. He became a poet. And he penned the words, The heavens declare the glory of God; the firmament shows his handiwork. That shepherd, that poet, became king. And those immortal words in Psalm 19 encapsulate the expressions that we have today—the handiwork of God—as we peer back in time, over 13 billion years ago, [and] capture the light from the very beginning of the creation.”
