‘New Hubble’ telescope lifts off
The $10bn successor to the Hubble telescope has successfully launched into space today.
The James Webb telescope launched from French Guiana after years of work which, scientists believe, will make it around a hundred times more powerful than its famous predecessor.
It is hoped the telescope will be able to pick up images of the very earliest stars and galaxies.
In particular scientists are hoping to identify the so-called pioneer stars – which followed the Big Bang as the very emergence of what we now know as the universe.
There will now be a six month period in which the telescope makes its way to an observation station more than 1m kilometres away from the planet Earth.
Photo credit: NASA