The main photo, which doesn't even hint at the power Webb will bring to the universe once it's fully operational, shows a star called HD 84406 and is only a portion of the mosaic taken over 25 hours beginning on Feb. 2, during the ongoing process to align the observatory's segmented mirror. "The entire Webb team is ecstatic at how well the first steps of taking images and aligning the telescope are proceeding," Marcia Rieke, principal investigator of the instrument that Webb relies on for the alignment procedure and an astronomer at the University of Arizona, said in a NASA statement. JWST is now 48 days out from its Christmas Day launch and in the midst of a commissioning process expected to last about six months. The telescope spent the first month unfolding from its launch configuration and trekking out nearly 1 million miles (1.5 million kilometers) away from Earth. During the bulk of the remaining time, scientists are focusing on waking and calibrating the observatory's instruments and making the minute adjustments to the telescope's 18 golden mirror segments that are necessary for crisp, clear images of the deep universe. The process is going well, according to NASA. Still, the telescope has a long way to go, as today's image of HD 84406 shows. [...] HD 84406 is in the constellation Ursa Major, or Big Bear, but is not visible from Earth without a telescope. But it was a perfect early target for Webb because its brightness is steady and the observatory can always spot it, so launch or deployment delays wouldn't affect the plan. Oddly, JWST won't be able to observe HD 84406 later in its tenure; once the telescope is focused, this star will be too bright to look at. Previously, JWST personnel have said that the telescope will be seeing fairly sharply by late April.
Makes me wonder why they released anything at all. A couple of weeks ago they said the first pic they'll release would be amazing. They even had internal discussions about what to release first. And now they're releasing calibration test images??
Liam Wright
No, it's a "the shillfaggots on Any Forums were wrong yet again" thread.
The real is a distillation of science, which, by definition, must be an impure mixture of all sorts of shit? And they want us to trust the science rather than the real?
It pisses me off so much that the people they're elevated into positions in science are all these weak dyed-hair faggot people, instead of tall, strong right wing chads. The left has moved their people into these positions.
Meanwhile the right is raving about this religious bullshit that's infected their minds, like a virus. We are losing so much human progress because of this. If you look behind the scenes of any of these projects you'll find some tall white programmer or engineer doing all the heavy lifting anyway.
The destiny of white people is in the stars. We are basically a super advanced interplanetary race that is trapped and confined on this planet. Ee have to spread our wings.
Leo Miller
>That will be $10,000,000,000 +tax +tip.
Julian Murphy
> crisp, clear images of the deep universe
Probably will find a sign about the holocaust. Oi vey.
Samuel Kelly
Calling themselves scientists, while wearing face under wear.
You fags are too cynical. This overpriced boondoggle is up there so might as well use it. The photos it makes will be PC wallpaper candy for 50 years. Kino and whitepilled.
Imagine if 12th century Euros would have had paintings of Yosemite and the Grand Tetons on their walls and could say, >Some day
Nolan Young
the space wallpapers you use are made by artists not by these telescopes
