Roman telescope's massive infrared mirror is ready to fly

Roman telescope's massive infrared mirror is ready to fly Sadie Harley Scientific Editor Andrew Zinin Lead Editor NASA has completed its final inspection of the primary mirror on the Roman Space Telescope, which measures 2.4 meters (7.9 feet) in diameter and contains a layer of silver hundreds of times thinner than a human hair, at 400 nanometers. The primary mirror will help accomplish Roman's mission objectives using near-infrared light, including studying dark matter and dark energy, discovering exoplanets through direct imaging and gravitational microlensing, and examining galaxy formation, evolution and star populations. "The Roman engineering team laid eyes on the telescope for the final time before it, in turn, becomes the eyes of humanity, revealing the wonders of the cosmos," said J. Scott Smith, Roman's optical telescope assembly manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "It is a profoundly humbling moment to witness the culmination of hard work from so many dedicated individuals, teams and partner organizations, including L3Harris." With this final inspection complete, NASA will now prepare to ship Roman to NASA's Kennedy Space Center for a planned launch in September 2026. Once launched, Roman will travel to the sun-Earth Lagrange point 2, or L2, approximately 1.5 million kilometers (1 million miles) directly behind Earth from the sun. For context, the moon is approximately 384,000 kilometers (239,000 miles) from Earth, and L2 is where NASA's James Webb Space Telescope currently orbits while conducting research in a variety of scientific fields, including exoplanet atmospheres, the first galaxies, and star and planet formation and evolution. Lagrange points are gravitationally stable locations in space produced by two large gravitational objects. Using Lagrange points has become common in space exploration because it reduces the amount of fuel a spacecraft requires to maintain its position. Instead, the spacecraft stays within this region with very few adjustments required. In the case of Earth and the sun, there are five Lagrange points: L1 through L5. L1 through L3 are known as saddle points, and L4 and L5 are known as hilltop points. While saddle points curve up in some regions, they curve down in others. Hilltop points have a high point, and a spacecraft that falls down the "hill" speeds up. While both types of Lagrange points require fuel to maintain their positions, this is substantially less than trying to keep a spacecraft in a fixed position on its own. Named after NASA's chief of astronomy, Nancy Grace Roman, the Roman telescope has been in development since 2014 and was initially named the Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope, or WFIRST. While Roman has an estimated total cost of almost $4 billion, this is more than half the total cost of JWST. Roman has also faced several financial and logistical hurdles during development, but this final inspection is a testament to NASA's dedication to pushing the boundaries of science. Provided by Universe Today