Roman Space Telescope: Two Weeks from Impossible to Possible

Roman Space Telescope's Focal Plane. 18 saltine sized detectors. Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

Countdown to Possible

In just a few short weeks, on August 30th, NASA will launch its newest Flagship Mission aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy Rocket from Kennedy Space Center's Pad 39A. The Roman Space Telescope is an exponential step into the future, building upon the legacy of the Hubble Telescope and its namesake, Dr. Edwin Hubble.

In 1924, Dr. Hubble proved Andromeda, the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way, was not part of the Milky Way but in fact a separate and distinct galaxy in its own right. A galaxy with over a trillion stars. Interestingly, with a seemingly endless number of targets within Roman's 5-year prime mission, Roman will produce the most detailed map of Andromeda in history. Dr. Hubble no doubt would be proud.

The Hubble telescope was launched aboard Space Shuttle Discovery in 1990, 66 years after Edwin Hubble's discovery. 36 years later, Hubble is still active well beyond its original 15-year prime mission. The Space Shuttle was an engineering marvel, and Hubble in LEO afforded the unique opportunity to provide ongoing operational support over its lifespan. A simply brilliant effort.

While Hubble was a technological masterpiece in its own right, Roman, on the verge of launch, is set to exponentially increase the scope and speed of science as never before. The volume of data collected in relation to total observation time is simply unprecedented.

The Numbers and Capabilities

• Roman Lagrange 2 vs. Hubble Low Earth Orbit

• 100x Hubble Coverage

• 1000x the Speed of Hubble - 1 Month vs. 100 years

• 80,000 Supernovae

• 100,000 Exoplanets

• 10,000,000,000 Galaxies

• Active Optics - Self-Adjusting Optical Platform

• 1.4 Terabytes of data captured and downloaded a day

• Ability to respond and investigate based on detections from other platforms

• Designed to be Refuelable

The numbers are staggering, but as Roman Chief Scientist Julie McEnery suggests, "the most exciting things from Roman will be a surprise, something we couldn't predict, but will set the stage for the next deeper set of questions for future missions to address."

An End to End Solution

Roman carries with it two key instruments: a wide-field infrared 300-megapixel camera and a coronagraph technology demonstration. But Roman is more than individual instruments and technology; it is a complete end-to-end platform, not only capturing never-before-seen images but also downloading, distributing, and supporting access for all once processing is complete.

The team appears to have thought of everything and thought of it end to end. Not simply the surveys, the complementary aspect of various platforms, the technology, but the capture, distribution, and access to the data. In fact, the distribution and distributed access could be considered a key aspect of what the communications industry considers disaster recovery. The model virtually ensures once captured, the data will never be lost. The next logical step may be to store the data in the ultimate cloud... off-world orbiting data centers high above cable cuts, power outages, and natural disasters.

Further, the dual or multi-use capability of the platform and data is unprecedented. As McEnery explains, "every single Roman observation will enable many different science investigations. So, for example, the same survey that will provide deep observations to study galaxies will also be used to find objects in the outer parts of our own solar system."

The Next Steps

Roman is not just a singular investment, tool, or capability. This Flagship mission enhances and adds another vessel to the collection of complementary space and ground-based platforms, such as Rubin, Hubble, Euclid, and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and sets the foundation essential for the future Habitable World Observatory (HWO). It envisions a future where NASA will directly image planets similar to Earth. Roman is far from being a standalone mission; it is a continuation of a roadmap to explore the universe.

And it doesn't end here. NASA is already thinking ahead.

"We're looking at Astrophysics at a more platform level. And we're even looking at concepts where, if you build five of the same observatory, what kind of view of the sky does that give you?" - Shawn Domagal-Goldman

Impossible

And this leads us to an important recurring theme. At inception NASA pursued the impossible and demonstrated the possible, and Roman is on the verge of doing just that again.

"Impossible to possible and sometimes routine." - Shawn Domagal-Goldman