NASA’s new space telescope is named after the woman who masterminded the existence of first observatories. Dr. Nancy Grace Roman, known as the “Mother of Hubble,” spent two decades at NASA developing and sending space-based observatories that tracked and monitored the Sun’s activity, Earth’s atmosphere, and more.
But, Dr. Roman’s most famous work is the Hubble Space Telescope, which spent recently its 30th year in orbit. Find more about NASA’s great lady and discover her endless space journey.
The Mother of Hubble Makes History
When the Hubble Space Telescope launched in 1990, it became the first of NASA’s mighty observatories, which are developed to push the limits of human knowledge about the Universe. Dr. Roman got the nickname “Mother of Hubble” for her dedication and work at the space telescope. She was also NASA’s first Chief of Astronomy, making her the first woman to have such an executive position at the space agency. Dr. Roman passed away two years ago.
NASA’s associate administrator for science, Thomas Zurbuchen, was the one who announced the new space telescope’s name. He stated: “For that reason: that vision, that foresight, that leadership…[Dr. Roman] is the only name that is appropriate for this large space telescope that we’re building now.”
Over its five-year lifetime, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will measure light from a billion galaxies and scan the inner Milky Way. NASA hopes to find at least 2,600 new planets and photograph them.
The new observatory is said to have a field of view 100 times higher than Hubble’s. Each of its shots will be equivalent to almost 100 Hubble pictures’ worth of pixels. That width will support scientists’ work for reviewing Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity and hunting for signs of “dark energy,” one of the most mysterious forces that make almost 70 % of the Universe.
