Planets - Blog Posts

₊ ⊹ WELCOME TO THIS SIDE OF THE STAR-MAP ₊ ⊹

.𖥔 ݁ ˖ My name is Xennie⋆｡° All Pronouns ✩ 9teen .ᐟ .𖥔 ݁ ˖

\\ My brain does a lot of things and it's silly to post things about it. \\

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆─

⋆.˚  ✰ .ᐟ S T A R N A V I G A T I O N ✰ .ᐟ ⬇ ‧₊˚ ┊ ⬇

⋆.˚𖦹⋆ It's mostly cringe. ⋆.˚𖦹⋆ ⤵

[ I type mostly on A03 ] - ⋆⭒Book Archive.⋆ °‧ 📓✧˖°..ᐟ.ᐟ

Here's my Carrd! *pulls out suitcase* 💼 ( Here you are ✧ )

⤷  Totally Professional Business Card 💳 ˖°..ᐟ.ᐟ

"MAKE A WISH"

Ask me a question, leave a message anything is fine .ᐟ

Audio and Scriptwriting will have a section soon .ᐟ

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INTERVIEW IN THE SPACECRAFT ✰ .ᐟ

"What types of things will be projected in this galaxy?"

"I'll make things more in order and presentable, but mostly updates for A03 chapters, along with different things I am currently typing for feedback and potential voice acting the things I type out! Drawing is something that is simply not my forte, so I write and I hope that's enjoyable."

"What type of people aren't supposed to in this orbit?"

"This galaxy is not for people that are homophobic, racist, pdflies, age players, and all that ugh, stuff." ⋆.˚𖦹⋆✮⋆.˚ 

"Can I message you?" { Because you're so great and everything you do is fabulously breath taking and I thought you were the sun! }

Awe shtawp! You're a star you really are! Send me a silly message and it'll be totally rad, as long as it's not super gross..

⋆. ˚𖦹⋆✮⋆. .

 \\ ♫⋆𝄞⨾𓍢ִ໋ If you're underage then a friendship won't be madee ♫⋆｡ 𝄞 \\

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┊ ┊ ┊ ┊ ˚★⋆｡˚ ⋆

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★⋆ ┊ . ˚

˚★

༊·˚ Be safe as you travel across the cold dark atmosphere.. Bye Bye little butterfly! ༊·˚ May the moon lead you home

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·˚ ༘₊· ͟͟͞͞꒰➳ 𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐎 𝐍𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐒 𝐈𝐕 ·˚ ༘

hello everyone! yes, yes im backkkk!!! im so sorry ive been inactive it's just school n everything n my mental health hasn't been the greatest (hope u guys understand <33)

some really sad news, i found out yesterday that my mum told me the wrong birthtime HAHAHHAHA (I want to die) but nothing major has changed just my rising and a few house placements <3

oo maybe in another post we could analyse my birthchart??

anyways, im glad to be back and this is about people ik irl so please take what resonates <33

new theme btw hehe

↳ aries rising, receding hairline check 💀

↳ sagittarius risings!! ur the best honestly like cmere and give me a big ol' cuddle

↳ no offence to some of yall saturn leo's... but you guys really need to focus and stop talking

↳ please stop calling taurus venus' materialistic! they just like to buy things when they feel good and that's absolutely okay

↳ earth mercuries can never do small talk or they get really bored of a conversation

↳ virgo risings WHY DO WE JOKE ABT OUR TRAUMA ALL THE TIME 💀

↳ capricorn men can choke. capricorn women though 😻💦🍑🍆

↳ any personal virgo placements - isn't fun when people assume ur mad all the time?

↳ june gemini's SHUT UP. SHUT UP. STOP TALKING ABOUT YOURSELF. YOU ARE A COMPULSIVE LIAR. (not all, just some i know 😁)

↳ i swear aquarius suns can come off as really condescending :/

↳ PISCES AND LIBRA WOMEN!!!!!!! U R THE BEST I LOVE U SM PLEASE KISS ME

↳ cancer mars how's that revenge going bbg

↳ idk why but scorpio men and i always have some sort of chemistry or flirty banter and honestly idm cause y'all are SEXY

↳ mercury-venus aspects, how u doing ;)

·˚ ༘₊· ͟͟͞͞꒰➳ 𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑

↳ virgo risings, venus, sun and saturn, please stop being overally judgemental over urself!!/u r beautiful, stunning n gorgeous just the way you are love <3333 (ex. bella hadid being critical over herself for getting plastic surgery) (ex. kim kardashian always worrying about aging)

↳ marilyn monroe (leo rising) was always in the spotlight and she still is now. marilyn is often referred as a top idol/role model and whilst she was alive, she was often over sexuslised :((

↳ air sun + risings are always musically talented idk why. it's mainly also their vocals with which they're really good at.

↳ scorpio personal placements are always so intense with their gaze. especially scorpio mars n sun - they'll just penetrate ur walls n make u weak n everything (AND THATS HOT)

i hope u guys enjoyed this!! sorry for it being so shit but first post coming back so yeah (still sorry <3)

love you! have a good day <33

minisvle© 2022 all rights reserved

The artistic vibes hit hard today so I drew planets as people! This is Uranus on the right and Neptune on the left. Both of them have warm cloaks because of how far they are from the sun! For Uranus I was inspired by the Greek god he was named after, who was the king of the sky and clouds (so many clouds and sky blues in the design.) As for Neptune, we went off of the planets naturally beautiful texture, and I wanted to make her more of a fighter character so we kept that in mind when designing her. These were so fun! I think I want to do more. 😁🔱🪐☁️☁️🌧️

Does anyone know a lot about the planets that could potentially support life? Just straight info dump on me. Cause I tried doing research and got confused, but I really want to know about them

BooBa is so incredibly lovely and strange your art is AWESOME🗣‼️

TYSMM, comments like these really motivate me to go back to characters and go out of my comfort zone more often :D here's some more art of Booba featuring my silly planet critter Solar cuz i thought their designs matched a little :)

this didnt turn out exactly the way i wanted it to but so far, with this style ive always done simpler characters than these two so i think considering that it looks quite good C:

yet anootherrr OC redesign (original design was made by my brother @tuymoth ⁉️💥💥)

alsoo the first two Turbo doodles i ever made from not that long ago (even tho i did watch the movie when it came out lmao (oops)) and a design WIP for my gf, both under the cut :•) VVVVVV

Planetary Dreams pg.2

Here is page 2 of my comic series Planetary Dreams. Here we have Rue waking up after crashing onto a planet she hasn’t discovered yet. Hope y’all enjoy it and the rest of the drawings i’ll make.

Planetary Dream pg.1

Rue was just enjoying a relaxing day of watching the stars and eating “space food” until some random hairy alien crashed into her ship. Hope y’all enjoy the series of this space alien.

Got these pictures I took of the moon through my telescope if anyone wants to see them

please like or reblog if you save it! 🛸

"Jupiter was meant to be a star but failed" or jupiter was a very successful planet? stop downgrading my man 🥀🥀

I heard Saturn is losing it's rings. She's going through a divorce😭

I have finally finished a collection of pride merchandise! I have tried to include as many flags as possible in my “Pride Planet”/”Space Pride” collection, and they are available on redbubble here! There is a wide variety of things they can go on or be with, and if you would like to see more in your own flag, or a flag of someone you know, I am always very happy to comply and add more! I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them for the wonderful people who wish to show off their pride!

The Solar System!

bonus Pluto!

~Art Dump May-July~

+I'm finally back after my 3 month break

++reblogs are every much appreciated<3

AN: Sorry for leaving for a little bit, I just wasn't motivated enough to do what I usually did for my post, which is taking photos(i hate doing that), editing, description writing and posting in general. I haven't been 100% happy with my art, and this is the best of the worst. I think I just needed a little bit of time to myself after all the stress from this school year ended. I think I'll be back from now. I'm not as consistent in art anymore, which sucks but I'll try to draw a bit more for you guys :)

come meet me at the martian sunset why dont ya. come fall in love with me why dont ya

Planet people

happy birthday @bvlnoriyas!! this gifset is for you

Drawtober Day 19

sailor 🌙 

Star Wars

Coruscant, Naboo, Tatooine

I may have a slight obsession with space,,,

Europa Clipper is a space mission crafted with one overarching goal: determine if Jupiter’s ocean moon, Europa, has conditions suitable for life. Watch launch live on Oct. 14 as the largest uncrewed spacecraft we've ever built begins its journey into the solar system.

A Tour of Cosmic Temperatures

We often think of space as “cold,” but its temperature can vary enormously depending on where you visit. If the difference between summer and winter on Earth feels extreme, imagine the range of temperatures between the coldest and hottest places in the universe — it’s trillions of degrees! So let’s take a tour of cosmic temperatures … from the coldest spots to the hottest temperatures yet achieved.

First, a little vocabulary: Astronomers use the Kelvin temperature scale, which is represented by the symbol K. Going up by 1 K is the same as going up 1°C, but the scale begins at 0 K, or -273°C, which is also called absolute zero. This is the temperature where the atoms in stuff stop moving. We’ll measure our temperatures in this tour in kelvins, but also convert them to make them more familiar!

We’ll start on the chilly end of the scale with our CAL (Cold Atom Lab) on the International Space Station, which can chill atoms to within one ten billionth of a degree above 0 K, just a fraction above absolute zero.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Just slightly warmer is the Resolve sensor inside XRISM, pronounced “crism,” short for the X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission. This is an international collaboration led by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) with NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). Resolve operates at one twentieth of a degree above 0 K. Why? To measure the heat from individual X-rays striking its 36 pixels!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Resolve and CAL are both colder than the Boomerang Nebula, the coldest known region in the cosmos at just 1 K! This cloud of dust and gas left over from a Sun-like star is about 5,000 light-years from Earth. Scientists are studying why it’s colder than the natural background temperature of deep space.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Let’s talk about some temperatures closer to home. Icy gas giant Neptune is the coldest major planet. It has an average temperature of 72 K at the height in its atmosphere where the pressure is equivalent to sea level on Earth. Explore how that compares to other objects in our solar system!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

How about Earth? According to NOAA, Death Valley set the world’s surface air temperature record on July 10, 1913. This record of 330 K has yet to be broken — but recent heat waves have come close. (If you’re curious about the coldest temperature measured on Earth, that’d be 183.95 K (-128.6°F or -89.2°C) at Vostok Station, Antarctica, on July 21, 1983.)

We monitor Earth's global average temperature to understand how our planet is changing due to human activities. Last year, 2023, was the warmest year on our record, which stretches back to 1880.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

The inside of our planet is even hotter. Earth’s inner core is a solid sphere made of iron and nickel that’s about 759 miles (1,221 kilometers) in radius. It reaches temperatures up to 5,600 K.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We might assume stars would be much hotter than our planet, but the surface of Rigel is only about twice the temperature of Earth’s core at 11,000 K. Rigel is a young, blue star in the constellation Orion, and one of the brightest stars in our night sky.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger 

We study temperatures on large and small scales. The electrons in hydrogen, the most abundant element in the universe, can be stripped away from their atoms in a process called ionization at a temperature around 158,000 K. When these electrons join back up with ionized atoms, light is produced. Ionization is what makes some clouds of gas and dust, like the Orion Nebula, glow.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We already talked about the temperature on a star’s surface, but the material surrounding a star gets much, much hotter! Our Sun’s surface is about 5,800 K (10,000°F or 5,500°C), but the outermost layer of the solar atmosphere, called the corona, can reach millions of kelvins.

Our Parker Solar Probe became the first spacecraft to fly through the corona in 2021, helping us answer questions like why it is so much hotter than the Sun's surface. This is one of the mysteries of the Sun that solar scientists have been trying to figure out for years.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Looking for a hotter spot? Located about 240 million light-years away, the Perseus galaxy cluster contains thousands of galaxies. It’s surrounded by a vast cloud of gas heated up to tens of millions of kelvins that glows in X-ray light. Our telescopes found a giant wave rolling through this cluster’s hot gas, likely due to a smaller cluster grazing it billions of years ago.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Now things are really starting to heat up! When massive stars — ones with eight times the mass of our Sun or more — run out of fuel, they put on a show. On their way to becoming black holes or neutron stars, these stars will shed their outer layers in a supernova explosion. These layers can reach temperatures of 300 million K!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Jeremy Schnittman

We couldn’t explore cosmic temperatures without talking about black holes. When stuff gets too close to a black hole, it can become part of a hot, orbiting debris disk with a conical corona swirling above it. As the material churns, it heats up and emits light, making it glow. This hot environment, which can reach temperatures of a billion kelvins, helps us find and study black holes even though they don’t emit light themselves.

JAXA’s XRISM telescope, which we mentioned at the start of our tour, uses its supercool Resolve detector to explore the scorching conditions around these intriguing, extreme objects.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/CI Lab

Our universe’s origins are even hotter. Just one second after the big bang, our tiny, baby universe consisted of an extremely hot — around 10 billion K — “soup” of light and particles. It had to cool for a few minutes before the first elements could form. The oldest light we can see, the cosmic microwave background, is from about 380,000 years after the big bang, and shows us the heat left over from these earlier moments.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

We’ve ventured far in distance and time … but the final spot on our temperature adventure is back on Earth! Scientists use the Large Hadron Collider at CERN to smash teensy particles together at superspeeds to simulate the conditions of the early universe. In 2012, they generated a plasma that was over 5 trillion K, setting a world record for the highest human-made temperature.

Want this tour as a poster? You can download it here in a vertical or horizontal version!

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger

Explore the wonderful and weird cosmos with NASA Universe on X, Facebook, and Instagram. And make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

What We Learned from Flying a Helicopter on Mars

The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter made history – not only as the first aircraft to perform powered, controlled flight on another world – but also for exceeding expectations, pushing the limits, and setting the stage for future NASA aerial exploration of other worlds.

Built as a technology demonstration designed to perform up to five experimental test flights over 30 days, Ingenuity performed flight operations from the Martian surface for almost three years. The helicopter ended its mission on Jan. 25, 2024, after sustaining damage to its rotor blades during its 72nd flight.

So, what did we learn from this small but mighty helicopter?

We can fly rotorcraft in the thin atmosphere of other planets.

Ingenuity proved that powered, controlled flight is possible on other worlds when it took to the Martian skies for the first time on April 19, 2021.

Flying on planets like Mars is no easy feat: The Red Planet has a significantly lower gravity – one-third that of Earth’s – and an extremely thin atmosphere, with only 1% the pressure at the surface compared to our planet. This means there are relatively few air molecules with which Ingenuity’s two 4-foot-wide (1.2-meter-wide) rotor blades can interact to achieve flight.

Ingenuity performed several flights dedicated to understanding key aerodynamic effects and how they interact with the structure and control system of the helicopter, providing us with a treasure-trove of data on how aircraft fly in the Martian atmosphere.

Now, we can use this knowledge to directly improve performance and reduce risk on future planetary aerial vehicles.

Creative solutions and “ingenuity” kept the helicopter flying longer than expected.

Over an extended mission that lasted for almost 1,000 Martian days (more than 33 times longer than originally planned), Ingenuity was upgraded with the ability to autonomously choose landing sites in treacherous terrain, dealt with a dead sensor, dusted itself off after dust storms, operated from 48 different airfields, performed three emergency landings, and survived a frigid Martian winter.

Fun fact: To keep costs low, the helicopter contained many off-the-shelf-commercial parts from the smartphone industry - parts that had never been tested in deep space. Those parts also surpassed expectations, proving durable throughout Ingenuity’s extended mission, and can inform future budget-conscious hardware solutions.

There is value in adding an aerial dimension to interplanetary surface missions.

Ingenuity traveled to Mars on the belly of the Perseverance rover, which served as the communications relay for Ingenuity and, therefore, was its constant companion. The helicopter also proved itself a helpful scout to the rover.

After its initial five flights in 2021, Ingenuity transitioned to an “operations demonstration,” serving as Perseverance’s eyes in the sky as it scouted science targets, potential rover routes, and inaccessible features, while also capturing stereo images for digital elevation maps.

Airborne assets like Ingenuity unlock a new dimension of exploration on Mars that we did not yet have – providing more pixels per meter of resolution for imaging than an orbiter and exploring locations a rover cannot reach.

Tech demos can pay off big time.

Ingenuity was flown as a technology demonstration payload on the Mars 2020 mission, and was a high risk, high reward, low-cost endeavor that paid off big. The data collected by the helicopter will be analyzed for years to come and will benefit future Mars and other planetary missions.

Just as the Sojourner rover led to the MER-class (Spirit and Opportunity) rovers, and the MSL-class (Curiosity and Perseverance) rovers, the team believes Ingenuity’s success will lead to future fleets of aircraft at Mars.

In general, NASA’s Technology Demonstration Missions test and advance new technologies, and then transition those capabilities to NASA missions, industry, and other government agencies. Chosen technologies are thoroughly ground- and flight-tested in relevant operating environments — reducing risks to future flight missions, gaining operational heritage and continuing NASA’s long history as a technological leader.

You can fall in love with robots on another planet.

Following in the tracks of beloved Martian rovers, the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter built up a worldwide fanbase. The Ingenuity team and public awaited every single flight with anticipation, awe, humor, and hope.

Check out #ThanksIngenuity on social media to see what’s been said about the helicopter’s accomplishments.

Learn more about Ingenuity’s accomplishments here. And make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

Of course Saturn brought its ring light.

On June 25, 2023, our James Webb Space Telescope made its first near-infrared observations of Saturn. The planet itself appears extremely dark at this infrared wavelength, since methane gas absorbs almost all the sunlight falling on the atmosphere. The icy rings, however, stay relatively bright, leading to Saturn’s unusual appearance in this image.

This new image of Saturn clearly shows details within the planet’s ring system, several of the planet’s moons (Dione, Enceladus, and Tethys), and even Saturn’s atmosphere in surprising and unexpected detail.

These observations from Webb are just a hint at what this observatory will add to Saturn’s story in the coming years as the science team delves deep into the data to prepare peer-reviewed results.

Download the full-resolution image, both labeled and unlabeled, from the Space Telescope Science Institute.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

5 Years, 8 Discoveries: NASA Exoplanet Explorer Sees Dancing Stars & a Star-Shredding Black Hole

This all-sky mosaic was constructed from 912 Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) images. Prominent features include the Milky Way, a glowing arc that represents the bright central plane of our galaxy, and the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds – satellite galaxies of our own located, respectively, 160,000 and 200,000 light-years away. In the northern sky, look for the small, oblong shape of the Andromeda galaxy (M 31), the closest big spiral galaxy, located 2.5 million light-years away. The black regions are areas of sky that TESS didn’t image. Credit: NASA/MIT/TESS and Ethan Kruse (University of Maryland College Park)

On April 18, 2018, we launched the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, better known as TESS. It was designed to search for planets beyond our solar system – exoplanets – and to discover worlds for our James Webb Space Telescope, which launched three years later, to further explore. TESS images sections of sky, one hemisphere at a time. When we put all the images together, we get a great look at Earth’s sky!

In its five years in space, TESS has discovered 326 planets and more than 4,300 planet candidates. Along the way, the spacecraft has observed a plethora of other objects in space, including watching as a black hole devoured a star and seeing six stars dancing in space. Here are some notable results from TESS so far:

During its first five years in space, our Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite has discovered exoplanets and identified worlds that can be further explored by the James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

1. TESS’ first discovery was a world called Pi Mensae c. It orbits the star Pi Mensae, about 60 light-years away from Earth and visible to the unaided eye in the Southern Hemisphere. This discovery kicked off NASA's new era of planet hunting.

2. Studying planets often helps us learn about stars too! Data from TESS & Spitzer helped scientists detect a planet around the young, flaring star AU Mic, providing a unique way to study how planets form, evolve, and interact with active stars.

Located less than 32 light-years from Earth, AU Microscopii is among the youngest planetary systems ever observed by astronomers, and its star throws vicious temper tantrums. This devilish young system holds planet AU Mic b captive inside a looming disk of ghostly dust and ceaselessly torments it with deadly blasts of X-rays and other radiation, thwarting any chance of life… as we know it! Beware! There is no escaping the stellar fury of this system. The monstrous flares of AU Mic will have you begging for eternal darkness. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

3. In addition to finding exoplanets on its own, TESS serves as a pathfinder for the James Webb Space Telescope. TESS discovered the rocky world LHS 3844 b, but Webb will tell us more about its composition. Our telescopes, much like our scientists, work together.

4. Though TESS may be a planet-hunter, it also helps us study black holes! In 2019, TESS saw a ‘‘tidal disruption event,’’ otherwise known as a black hole shredding a star.

When a star strays too close to a black hole, intense tides break it apart into a stream of gas. The tail of the stream escapes the system, while the rest of it swings back around, surrounding the black hole with a disk of debris. Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

5. In 2020, TESS discovered its first Earth-size world in the habitable zone of its star – the distance from a star at which liquid water could exist on a planet’s surface. Earlier this year, a second rocky planet was discovered in the system.

You can see the exoplanets that orbit the star TOI 700 moving within two marked habitable zones, a conservative habitable zone, and an optimistic habitable zone. Planet d orbits within the conservative habitable zone, while planet e moves within an optimistic habitable zone, the range of distances from a star where liquid surface water could be present at some point in a planet’s history. Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

6. Astronomers used TESS to find a six-star system where all stars undergo eclipses. Three binary pairs orbit each other, and, in turn, the pairs are engaged in an elaborate gravitational dance in a cosmic ballroom 1,900 light-years away in the constellation Eridanus.

7. Thanks to TESS, we learned that Delta Scuti stars pulse to the beat of their own drummer. Most seem to oscillate randomly, but we now know HD 31901 taps out a beat that merges 55 pulsation patterns.

Sound waves bouncing around inside a star cause it to expand and contract, which results in detectable brightness changes. This animation depicts one type of Delta Scuti pulsation — called a radial mode — that is driven by waves (blue arrows) traveling between the star's core and surface. In reality, a star may pulsate in many different modes, creating complicated patterns that enable scientists to learn about its interior. Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

8. Last is a galaxy that flares like clockwork! With TESS and Swift, astronomers identified the most predictably and frequently flaring active galaxy yet. ASASSN-14ko, which is 570 million light-years away, brightens every 114 days!

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

Roman’s Family Portrait of Millions of Galaxies

About 15 years ago, our Hubble Space Telescope captured this ultra-deep field image of space, revealing thousands of galaxies tucked away in a seemingly empty spot in the sky.

Now, imagine this view of the cosmos – and all the mysteries in it – at a scale 300 times larger than Hubble's.

Our upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Telescope could capture just that.

Roman recently released this gorgeous simulated image that gives us a preview of what the telescope could see. Each tiny speck represents a galaxy filled with billions of stars. And it’s more than just a pretty picture – scientists could learn a lot from an observation like this!

Since Roman can see much more of the sky at a time, it could create an ultra-deep field image that’s far larger than Hubble’s. So instead of revealing thousands of galaxies, Roman would see millions!

Roman’s ability to look far out into space with such an expansive view would help us better understand what the universe was like when it was young. For example, scientists could study a lot of cosmic transitions, like how galaxies switch from star-making factories to a quieter stage when star formation is complete and how the universe went from being mainly opaque to the brilliant starscape we see today.

And these are just a few of the mysteries Roman could help us solve!

Set to launch in the mid-2020s, our Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, is designed to unravel the secrets of dark energy and dark matter, search for and image exoplanets, and explore many topics in infrared astrophysics. You can learn about some of the other science Roman will do here.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

That’s a wrap! Thank you for all the wonderful questions. James Webb Space Telescope Planetary Scientist Dr. Naomi Rowe-Gurney answered questions about the science goals, capabilities, and her hopes for the world's most powerful telescope.

Check out her full Answer Time for more: Career | Science Goals | Capabilities

We hope you enjoyed today and learned something new about the Webb mission! Don’t miss the historic launch of this first-of-its kind space observatory. Tune in to NASA TV HERE on Dec. 22 starting at 7:20 a.m. EST (12:20 UTC).

If today’s Answer Time got you excited, explore all the ways you can engage with the mission before launch! Join our #UnfoldTheUniverse art challenge, our virtual social event with international space agencies, and countdown to liftoff with us. Check out all the ways to participate HERE.

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