Webb sunshield gives an 'open wide' for inspection
Wednesday, August 12, 2015 - 16:20
in Astronomy & Space
The sunshield on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is the largest part of the observatory—five layers of thin, silvery membrane that must unfurl reliably in space. The precision in which the tennis-court sized sunshield has to open must be no more than a few centimeters different from its planned position.