Integration of the NIRSpec instrument
One of the major milestones for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has been, in September 2013, the completion by ESA of NIRSpec, the first multi-object spectrograph to be operated in space.
JWST is the successor of the Hubble Space Telescope, built in a partnership between ESA, NASA and the Canadian Space Agency. Scheduled for launch in 2018, it consists of a 6.5m deployable mirror, making it the largest astronomical telescope in space. Thanks to giant deployable sunshields, the telescope and the instrument will be kept in the shade of the sun and will cool to temperatures below -233 C, optimal for observations in the near infrared.
NIRSpec is one of the two instruments that ESA is contributing to the JWST. NIRSpec has the capability of detecting the light from the first stars, when the Universe was less than 3% of its current age. Thanks to new cutting edge technology (Micro Shutter Array), NIRSpec can obtain the spectrum of more than 100 astronomical objects simultaneously. Such spectra are expected to reveal the physical properties and chemical enrichment of the first galaxies formed in the Universe.
NIRSpec will also be capable of an unprecedented investigation of the birth sites of stars in our Galalaxy, by piercing through the dusty clouds embedding these young systems, and will also allow the investigation of the atmospheres of planets outside our solar system, with the ultimate goal of detecting signatures of life.
Cambridge, and in particular the Cavendish Astrophysics Group and the Kavli Institute for Cosmology, is heavily involved in NIRSpec by hosting one of the Instrument Science Team members (R. Maiolino). The Instrument Science Team has contributed to the design of the instrument and to the definition of its observing modes, and has access to the associated Guaranteed Observing Time.
On September 20th NIRspec has been delivered to the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, where it is being assembled within the telescope structure and where it will undergo a series of tests at cryogenic temperature.