Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland 20771

ENGINEERING COLLOQUIUM

Monday, November 17, 2003 / 3:30 PM, Building 3 Auditorium

John Mather

"The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)"

ABSTRACT -- The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), now planned for launch in August 2011, has made great progress since the prime contractor was selected in 2002. Almost all teams are in place, requirements are complete, and technologies have been selected. The JWST will have a segmented beryllium telescope, cooled to below 40 K, and will carry an instrument package covering the 0.6 to 28 micrometer range. It will search for the first luminous objects in the universe using infrared light (owing to the cosmic redshift) and will examine locations of star and planet formation. I will report on the scientific objectives and the current design concepts.

SPEAKER -- Dr. John C. Mather is a senior astrophysicist in the Infrared Astrophysics Branch at NASA GSFC. He led the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite science effort from its proposal in 1974 through the conclusion of the data analysis in 1998. As PI for the Far IR Absolute Spectrophotometer, he showed that the cosmic microwave background has a blackbody spectrum to 50 parts per million. Since 1995 he has been the NASA Study Scientist and then Senior Project Scientist for the James Webb Space Telescope. He chairs the international Science Working Group and serves as interface in the Project between scientific and engineering concerns. He has received many awards, and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences.