James Webb Space Telescope poised to provide insight into chemical evolution of universe
By 
Tim Wogan2021-12-08T14:30:00
Launch later this month could provide new understanding of exoplanets and the origins of heavier elements
If all goes to plan, at 12.20pm UK time on 22 December, Nasa’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will lift off from a spaceport in French Guiana aboard a European rocket. It will then undertake a 30-day, 1.5 million km voyage through space to a Lagrange point – where the combined gravitational fields of the Earth and Sun are at equilibrium. From this vantage point, the telescope will orbit the sun in lockstep with the Earth for five to 10 years, conducting the most detailed near- and mid-infrared observations of the universe to date. This should provide a new window into nucleosynthesis in primordial galaxies, and allow intricate study of the chemical composition of outer space.