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Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer Ready For Launch On December 9
Pasadena CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2009 The launch of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket is scheduled for Wednesday, Dec. 9. Liftoff will be from NASA's Space Launch Complex 2 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The launch window is approximately 14 minutes in duration, extending from 6:09:33 to 6:23:51 a.m. PST (9:09:33 to 9:23:51 a.m. EST). The spacecraft's final circular polar orbit will be 525 kilometers (326 miles), orbiting Earth 15 times a day. The mission will scan the entire sky in infrared light with sensitivity hundreds of times greater than ever before possible, picking up the glow of hundreds of millions of objects and producing millions of images. The mission will uncover objects never before seen, including the coolest stars, the universe's most luminous galaxies and some of the darkest near-Earth asteroids and comets. The voluminous quantity of images WISE can generate will help scientists answer fundamental questions about the origins of planets, stars and galaxies, and provide data for astronomers for decades to come. During the nine-month survey mission, snapshots can be taken as frequently as every 11 seconds. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The mission's principal investigator, Edward (Ned) Wright, is at UCLA. The mission was competitively selected under NASA's Explorers Program, managed by the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. The science instrument was built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory, Logan, Utah, and the spacecraft was built by Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. The launch is the responsibility of NASA's Launch Services Program, headquartered at the Kennedy Space Center, Fla. The Delta II launch service is being provided to Kennedy by United Launch Alliance, Denver, Colo. Share This Article With Planet Earth
Related Links NASA WISE Astronomy News from Skynightly.com
Cosmic Slot Machine Matches Galaxy CollisionsWashington DC (SPX) Nov 25, 2009 A new website will give everyone the chance to contribute to science by playing a 'cosmic slot machine' and compare images of colliding galaxies with millions of simulated images of galactic pile-ups. These collisions, which astronomers call 'galactic mergers', could be the key to finding out why the Universe contains the mix of galaxies it does - some with trailing spiral arms, others ... read more |
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