NASA launches its newest space telescope

NASA has launched the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, an advanced observatory designed to search for answers to some of the universe’s biggest mysteries.

The SpaceX Falcon rocket carrying the telescope lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on August 30. NASA said the launch followed the Hubble telescope, sent into space in 1990, and the James Webb Space Telescope, launched in 2021.

The telescope was developed by NASA scientists at a cost of more than $4 billion. Over the next five years, it is expected to investigate dark matter and dark energy, as well as search for new planets beyond the solar system.

After reaching Earth orbit, the telescope will separate from the rocket and travel to a location known as a Lagrange point, where it will remain and study the universe. The point is 1.6 million kilometers from Earth. At such locations, the gravitational forces of two large celestial bodies, such as the Sun and Earth, balance with centrifugal force, allowing a small spacecraft or telescope to maintain a relatively stable position without using large amounts of additional fuel.

The telescope honors Nancy Grace Roman, regarded as NASA’s first chief astronomer and a pioneer of space-based astronomy.