As ferramentas do telescópio espacial James Webb estiveram, intermitentemente, em modo de segurança, desde o passado dia 7 de dezembro. As operações científicas só foram integralmente retomadas esta semana, segundo a NASA.
A agência espacial norte-americana indicou que tudo foi provocado por um glitch no software do aparelho. Apesar do erro, a mesma garante que, "todos os instrumentos estão de boa saúde".
O James Webb é um telescópio espacial de 10 mil milhões de dólares cuja principal função é registar imagens do espaço com a ajuda de infravermelhos. Trata-se de um aparelho de ponta, capaz de captar fotografias altamente detalhadas que são essenciais à compreensão do universo. Nos primeiros seis meses de atividade, o telescópio foi responsável por algumas imagens que viralizaram nas redes sociais, como o mais recente registo dos Pilares da Criação.
Veja algumas das imagens já captadas
![This image from Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) instrument shows a portion of the GOODS-North field of galaxies. At the lower right, a pullout highlights the galaxy GN-z11, which is seen at a time just 430 million years after the Big Bang. The image reveals an extended component, tracing the GN-z11 host galaxy, and a central, compact source whose colours are consistent with those of an accretion disc surrounding a black hole. [Image description: A rectangular image with thousands of galaxies of various shapes and colours on the black background of space. Some are noticeably spirals, either face-on or edge-on, while others are blobby ellipticals. Many are too small to discern any structure. One prominent foreground star at top centre features Webb’s signature eight-point diffraction spikes. At lower right, a small region is highlighted with a white box. Vertical lines extend upward like a cone to the bottom corners of a larger box at upper right, showing a zoomed-in version of the highlighted area. The pullout features a galaxy labelled GN-z11, seen as a fuzzy yellow dot. Above it is another galaxy, seen as a fuzzy red oval.]](http://mb.web.sapo.io/f6f30cda88cbe87e155871ba5170c9132f94fd15.jpg)
![This two-part graphic shows evidence of a gaseous clump of helium in the halo surrounding the galaxy GN-z11. In the top portion, at the far right, a small box identifies GN-z11 in a field of galaxies. The middle box shows a zoomed-in image of the galaxy. The box at the far left displays a map of the helium gas in the halo of GN-z11, including a clump that does not appear in the infrared colours shown in the middle panel. In the lower half of the graphic, a spectrum shows the distinct ‘fingerprint’ of helium in the halo. The full spectrum shows no evidence of other elements and so suggests that the helium clump must be fairly pristine, made almost entirely of hydrogen and helium gas left over from the Big Bang, without much contamination from heavier elements produced by stars. Theory and simulations in the vicinity of particularly massive galaxies from these epochs predict that there should be pockets of pristine gas surviving in the halo, and these may collapse and form Population III star clusters. [Image description: A graphic labelled Galaxy GN-z11, Pristine Gas Clump Near GN-z11. The graphic is divided into two sections. The top half of the graphic features a rectangular image of a field of galaxies with two pullouts, the second of them labelled Helium Two Detected. The bottom half shows a single line graph.]](http://mb.web.sapo.io/e88335c0ecb525e2977cdb7fda8db35d60433f94.jpg)
![This image of the GOODS-North field, captured by Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), shows compass arrows, a scale bar, and a colour key for reference. The north and east compass arrows show the orientation of the image on the sky. Note that the relationship between north and east on the sky (as seen from below) is flipped relative to direction arrows on a map of the ground (as seen from above). The scale bar is labelled in angular distance on the sky, where one arcsecond is one 3600th of a degree. The scale bar is 60 arcseconds long. This image shows invisible near-infrared wavelengths of light that have been translated into visible-light colours. The colour key shows which NIRCam filters were used when collecting the light. The colour of each filter name is the visible light colour used to represent the infrared light that passes through that filter. [Image description: A rectangular image shows thousands of galaxies of various shapes and colours on the black background of space. The pullout features a galaxy labelled GN-z11, seen as a fuzzy yellow dot. Above it is another galaxy, seen as a fuzzy red oval. To the left of the small box, a scale bar is labelled 60 arcseconds. It extends about one tenth of the way across the image. Below the image, a list of NIRCam filters show what colours were used to make the image. Filters shown in blue are F090W, F115W, and F150W. Filters shown in green are F200W, F277W, and F335M. Filters shown in red are F356W, F410M, and F444W.]](http://mb.web.sapo.io/e5b881b601f585337061240e616183a872385437.jpg)
![This image from Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) instrument shows a portion of the GOODS-North field of galaxies. [Image description: A rectangular image with thousands of galaxies of various shapes and colours on the black background of space. Some are noticeably spirals, either face-on or edge-on, while others are blobby ellipticals. Many are too small to discern any structure. One prominent foreground star at top centre features Webb’s signature eight-point diffraction spikes.]](http://mb.web.sapo.io/2041446b9a53fd51681679e5383d06e674e14b2e.jpg)
A NASA explica que o glitch aconteceu no sistema de controlo do James Webb, que é responsável por determinar para onde o aparelho está a apontar. Sem a possibilidade de redirecionar o telescópio, algumas das observações tiveram de ser suspensas e a agência está agora a recalendarizá-las.
Importa sublinhar que o James Webb não seve apenas para fotografar o cosmos. O aparelho é também responsável por detetar fontes de luz que o Hubble não tinha capacidade para identificar. Um dos objetivos deste telescópio é inspecionar estas luzes e perceber de onde emergiram e como evoluíram.
O telescópio foi lançado precisamente há um ano, a 27 de dezembro de 2021, e continua a demonstrar a sua capacidade de explorar o Universo e surpreender com as imagens captadas.
Veja ou reveja as imagens do lançamento
Pergunta do Dia
Veja também
Em destaque
-
Multimédia
Telescópio Hubble está de parabéns e festeja com nova imagem espacial “de tirar o fôlego” -
Site do dia
Inteligência artificial ajuda a encontrar locais secretos em cidades que visita -
App do dia
Teste os seus conhecimentos sobre a música e cultura rap com esta app gratuita -
How to TEK
Instagram já deixa editar mensagens, mas há mais novidades para experimentar
Comentários