Behind the Webb Stretching Webb's Wings (Episode 8, November 2010) @NASAWebbTelescope

Uploaded April 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

Release Date: November 17, 2010

One of the dominant features of the Webb telescope is its tennis-court-sized sunshield. The sunshield protects the observatory from unwanted light, keeping it cool and allowing it to detect heat from faraway objects in the universe.

Getting such a huge sunshield into orbit, however, is a technical feat. Webb's sunshield–folded up during launch–unraveles in a deployment process as the Webb telescope reaches its destination a million miles from Earth. Two deployable towers, or Mid Boom Assemblies (MBA), serve to stretch the sunshield open. The completion of this hour-long process triggers another mechanism that separates the sunshield's five layers, readying the sunshield for work.

Credit: NASA, Mary Estacion (STScI)

Behind the Webb Stretching Webbs Wings (Episode 8, November 2010)

Photons Received: Webb Sees Its First Star – 18 Times

$Tiny Mic: Whats your favorite Webb image? (Dr. Jane Rigby) We’re celebrating Webb’s third launchaversary this month by asking you to pick your favorite image. We thought it was only fair to go first. Here Dr. Jane Rigby, our Webb Senior Project Scientist, talks about her favorite Webb image. 0:00 White text reads “We asked Dr. Jane Rigby…” on a background of Webb’s image of Westerlund 1, a dense cluster of bright stars, each with six large and two small diffraction spikes. 0:01 White text that reads “What’s your favorite Webb image?” fades on. 0:05 Jane stands in her office, in front of a standing desk, and talks into a tiny mic. 0:26 Animation of the Webb telescope mirrors, seen from the side. The primary mirror segments are slightly adjusting angles, with white beams of light that slowly converge on the secondary mirror, which is above them from this angle. 0:29 Fade into Webb’s primary mirror “selfie” image, with each hexagonal mirror appearing flat white against a black background. Three black struts create a tripod that meets in the middle of the mirror. 0:31 Back to Jane talking in her office. 0:35 Animation of Webb in space. The camera flies past Webb, and as it does, dozens of stars are shown reflected in the primary mirror. 0:43 Back to Jane. 1:02 Tight shot of Jane’s computer, with her hand gesturing toward the screen. The screen has an image of stars and galaxies, against the black background of space. 1:12 Back to the wider shot of Jane. 1:23 Fade to Webb’s alignment image, a bright red and orange star with long diffraction spikes against a black background of space.$

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