| Subject: Nasa launches Infrared Telescope |
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Teddy
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Date Posted: 14:41:50 08/25/03 Mon
A $2bn space observatory that can study the early history of the Universe has been launched by Nasa.
The Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF), as it is called, will detect infrared energy (heat) emitted from stars, galaxies and planets.
Astronomers will be able to study distant objects hidden by gas and dust that cannot be detected with visible light telescopes.
Because of its longer wavelengths, infrared light can traverse through thick, obscuring clouds of dust much better than visible light can.
Young stars emerging from dusty galaxies that existed when the Universe was only about three billion years old are of particular interest.
The observatory has begun its journey into space on a Boeing Delta 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 1:35 a.m. EDT on Monday, August 25.
Now, SIRTF will fill the gap by targeting the infrared universe.
SIRTF is the largest, most sensitive, infrared telescope ever to be sent into space.
It will orbit for two to five years, drifting ever further into deep space.
UK astrophysicists will be among those making use of the observatory. They will survey the sky for infrared galaxies found up to 10 billion light years away.
"It allows us to look through dust," says Dr Sebastian Oliver of the Astronomy Centre at the University of Sussex. "This allows us to study objects that would otherwise be hidden."
Astronomers will be able to look back to a time when the Universe was a very violent place and many new stars were being born.
Michael Rowan-Robinson of Imperial College London says they will be able to look far deeper in the infrared than any previous survey.
"By looking back through almost 90% of the Universe's history, we shall be able to look back to a period when star formation was much more frequent than it is today," he says.
"This will enable us to trace the evolution of star formation from very early times."
The visible light from the farthest reaches of the cosmos has been shifted into the infrared.
The launch of SIRFT marks the completion of Nasa's Great Observatories Program.
The Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory study the Universe at other wavelengths.
Two are still in operation but Compton was taken out of commission in June 2000.
The Compton Gamma Ray Observatory crashed safely back to Earth, in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean after being sent orders to destroy itself by the US space agency Nasa.
The satellite, the size of a bus, was taken out of commission because of fears it could have plummeted to Earth in an uncontrolled re-entry over a populated area.
The European Space Agency is launching a larger infrared telescope - Herschel - in 2007.
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