The Launch of the Nancy Grace Roman Telescope Promises a Look into Undiscovered Corners of Our Universe
NASA released a new telescope to orbit 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, it’s expected to be capable of capturing 100 times the images of the Hubble.
As of Sep. 28, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, which is more commonly referred to as “Roman,” has been traveling almost 29 days and is a little less than 1.4 million kilometers from Earth.
In comparison to the Hubble Space Telescope, Roman will soon be capable of capturing a field image 100 times more vast. Both the Hubble and the James Webb space telescopes will remain in orbit for continued, in-depth observation. The addition of Roman is intended to add to this observation through wider range images, which will identify areas for the other telescopes to focus in on.
Much like the Hubble, Roman is a reflective telescope. There are a few key structural differences in these telescopes, however, that make them both unique. While the Hubble is armed with a long focal length and two mirrors, Roman has three mirrors and a short focal length. The shorter the focal length, the wider the field of view the instrument is capable of capturing. The longer the focal length, the more capable the instrument is of capturing detailed, zoomed-in images.
Dr. Nancy Grace Roman, the woman for whom Roman was named, is often fondly referred to as “the mother of the Hubble.” Born in 1925 in Nashville, Tennessee, Roman developed a fascination with space early on in her life. She attended a multitude of colleges, and in 1949 she earned her PhD in astronomy from the University of Chicago.
As a woman in the field of astronomy, Roman faced discrimination and adversity throughout her career. It took her years of hard work and multiple discoveries, specifically in spectroscopy, to finally be acknowledged by the scientific community. Her title as “Hubble’s mother” came from her long, tiresome battle with Congress to get the Hubble launched during her time as NASA’s Chief of Astronomy.
The talented team of astronomers currently tracking Roman’s progress as it travels to the second Lagrange point (L2), predict that it will arrive there and begin data collection in early Dec. The second Lagrange point is a point where a telescope can orbit the sun at the same rate as the Earth does.
There are a number of resources already out there tracking Roman’s progress through the night sky. Remember to utilize clear nights, when we have them, to do some stargazing! We might not have images from Roman yet, but we have our eyes, and that’s where all great astronomers start!
Article by Penny Deitz