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A Journey to the End of Time

The Solar System in 3D, in real time

A simulation of the Solar System driven by real ephemerides. The Sun, the planets, Pluto and the major moons, space probes, the International Space Station, nearby stars and the black hole at the centre of the Milky Way are where they really are at the chosen moment. You can run time from 1700 to 2100, fly from one object to another and look at the sky from anywhere on Earth.

JWST

Space probe

Facts

Launch
25 December 2021
Primary mirror
6.5 m, 18 hexagonal beryllium segments
Sunshield
5 layers of Kapton, the size of a tennis court
First science images
July 2022

The James Webb Space Telescope is the largest, most powerful and most complex telescope ever launched into space: a joint mission of NASA, ESA and CSA that orbits the Sun at the L2 point, 1.5 million km from Earth.

Its mirror is coated with a layer of gold 100 nanometres thick, which reflects infrared light better. The sunshield cuts the Sun's heat by more than a million times, and the MIRI instrument works at 7 kelvin, chilled by a cryocooler.

It is named after James E. Webb, who led NASA from February 1961 to October 1968, in the years of the Apollo programme.

Sources