The James Webb Space Telescope Mission: Optical Telescope Element Design, Development, and Performance

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is a large, infrared space telescope that has recently started its science program which will enable breakthroughs in astrophysics and planetary science. Notably, JWST will provide the very first observations of the earliest luminous objects in the Universe and start a new era of exoplanet atmospheric characterization. This transformative science is enabled by a 6.6 m telescope that is passively cooled with a 5-layer sunshield. The primary mirror is comprised of 18 controllable, low areal density hexagonal segments, that were aligned and phased relative to each other in orbit using innovative image-based wavefront sensing and control algorithms. This revolutionary telescope took more than two decades to develop with a widely distributed team across engineering disciplines. We present an overview of the telescope requirements, architecture, development, superb on-orbit performance, and lessons learned. JWST successfully demonstrates a segmented aperture space telescope and establishes a path to building even larger space telescopes.Comment: accepted by PASP for JWST Overview Special Issue; 34 pages, 25 figure

The James Webb Space Telescope Mission

Twenty-six years ago a small committee report, building on earlier studies, expounded a compelling and poetic vision for the future of astronomy, calling for an infrared-optimized space telescope with an aperture of at least $4m$. With the support of their governments in the US, Europe, and Canada, 20,000 people realized that vision as the $6.5m$ James Webb Space Telescope. A generation of astronomers will celebrate their accomplishments for the life of the mission, potentially as long as 20 years, and beyond. This report and the scientific discoveries that follow are extended thank-you notes to the 20,000 team members. The telescope is working perfectly, with much better image quality than expected. In this and accompanying papers, we give a brief history, describe the observatory, outline its objectives and current observing program, and discuss the inventions and people who made it possible. We cite detailed reports on the design and the measured performance on orbit.Comment: Accepted by PASP for the special issue on The James Webb Space Telescope Overview, 29 pages, 4 figure

Chemistry of desiccant properties of carbohydrate polymers as studied by near-infrared spectroscopy

The combination frequency of water molecule in near-infrared spectroscopy is very useful for studying water molecular adsorption on solid surfaces. The absorption is purely from water molecules, and the variation in the absorption bands reflects the change in the environment of the water molecules on a surface. This variation, in turn, reflects the nature of the functional groups on the surface. Recently, Christy used this information in combination with second-derivative techniques to probe the surface of hydrothermally treated silica gel samples (Ind. Eng. Chem. Res.2011, 50, 5543). In this work, a similar approach was used in studying the surface OH groups in carbohydrate polymers and their behavior toward water molecular adsorption. Not only second-derivative profiles but also fourth-derivative profiles of the near-infrared spectra were used in revealing the adsorption behavior of the OH groups on the polymer surface. Carbohydrate polymers such as amylose amylopectin, cellulose, and starch samples were used in this study. After being heated and evacuated at 120 °C, the samples were exposed to air, and the evolving changes on the surfaces of the samples were followed by near-infrared spectroscopy. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the samples in adsorbing water molecules was followed by monitoring the mass of water adsorbed. These investigations formed the basis for understanding how the OH groups on the carbohydrate polymers adsorb water molecules. The results clearly reveal that carbohydrate polymers such as amylose, amylopectin, and cellulose have three OH groups of different polarities and that the OH groups attached to C2 and C3 positions in the monomer glucose units adsorb water molecules faster than the C6-OH group. Furthermore, the adsorption of water molecules in amylose and amylopectin follows the same pattern during the first hour, irrespective of the variation in their structure