The James Webb Space Telescope was launched in December with many sophisticated instruments aboard, including a Canadian guidance camera and scientific instrument co-developed by researchers at the Université de Montréal. Now those same experts, led by Professor René Doyon of the Department of Physics, are preparing for the telescope's next big step: the release this summer of the first images it's captured.
Experts in infrared instrumentation, the large team of astrophysicists at UdeM's Institute for Research on Exoplanets (iREx) - professors, scientists and PhD students - are once again available to talk about the telescope's progress to journalists (see below).
The result of an international collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency, the Webb Telescope orbits the Sun at 1.5 million kilometers from Earth and is the most important observatory for thousands of astronomers around the world. One of the Canadian instuments aboard is the Fine Guidance Sensor, or FGS. It helps orient the telescope in space to point to, track and take clear and precise images of celestial targets. The other Canadian component is the Near Infrared Imager and Slitless Spectrograph, or NIRISS; it will allow astronomers to study exoplanets, faraway galaxies and much more. UdeM's scientists developed both instuments in collaboration with the Canadian Space Agency, the National Research Council of Canada, Honeywell Canada and other partners.
"The latest news is that we've just completed the mirror's 'fine phasing,' which means that the mirror is aligned, at least for one instrument, and the optics are working better than the original specifications, which is great news," said Nathalie Ouellette, one of UdeM's experts.
"This March we released an alignment evaluation image which represents the sharpest view in the infrared of that part of the sky ever taken, and we're now aligning the mirror perfectly for all four of Webb's instruments," she said. "We're continuing to calibrate the scientific instruments, including the Canadian NIRISS. Canada's guiding camera, FGS, is working wonderfully - better than expected, even - and is being used throughout calibrations. The first images should be published this summer."
Here is the full list of UdeM experts for the media to consult.
FGS/NIRISS instrument design; exoplanets; Webb mission overview
René Doyon, Professor, Department of Physics, Principal Investigator of the FGS/NIRISS instrument
Expertise: State-of-the-art astronomical instrumentation for various observatories, on the ground and in space. Brown dwarfs, exoplanets and young low mass stars. Search for extraterrestrial life.
Languages spoken: French, English
Press review of René Doyon
