James Webb Space Telescope Feed Post

JWST Will Hunt for Dead Solar Systems—and Much More—in Its Second Year of Science

White dwarfs, Earth-sized exoplanets, early galaxies and even Saturn’s moon Enceladus are on the agenda for JWST’s second year in space, but exomoons and others miss out Where do you point the world’s most powerful space telescope? It’s not an easy question. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), launched in December 2021, has amazed astronomers since it began sending back its first science data in July 2022. It has seen galaxies breathtakingly close to the dawn of time, probed the atmospheres of exoplanets in unprecedented detail and provided stunning new views of worlds in our solar system. But it’s just getting started. Last week on May 10 astronomers learned if their proposals for the telescope’s second year of science were successful. Competition was fierce, and while there were plenty of winners and some incredible science set to be conducted, there were many more who missed out on JWST’s “Cycle 2,” which starts next month. “There was an extraordinary response from the science community,” says Nancy Levenson, interim director of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Maryland, which runs JWST. Read more at Scientific American