Webb Space Telescope – Feb 7

We have a new supersensitive eye in the cosmic sky. Parked nearly one million miles from Earth, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is ~100 times more sensitive than the Hubble Space Telescope. JWST observes at "low" frequencies, from the red to the mid-infrared parts of the spectrum, offering new insights into a vast array of objects and processes including solar system formation, star birth and death, galaxy evolution, and, perhaps, the origins of life.

Our speaker, UC Berkeley's Professor Alex Filippenko, will present early findings from JWST. Alex was voted UC Berkeley's "best professor" nine times; he is the only astronomer to contribute to both research teams whose work earned the 2011 Physics Nobel Prize; and among his many awards is Wonderfest's Carl Sagan Prize for Science Popularization.