Why Did the U.S. Spend 13 Trillion on Launching a Space Telescope? [Reading Science]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bong-su] The United States' cutting-edge James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has been producing remarkable achievements immediately after beginning official observations. Astronomers are astounded by JWST’s images that observe the "primordial starlight" and show the existence of extraterrestrial life, as well as the birth, growth, and death of stars and galaxies with unprecedented precision. However, this amazement is primarily among ‘astronomers.’ The general public is largely unaware. What significance does this hold? Why is the United States investing enormous amounts of money to uncover the secrets of the universe?

The cost for the United States, together with the European Space Agency (ESA) and Canada, to launch JWST reached $10 billion, approximately 13 trillion won. The U.S. is conducting four major large-scale space telescope programs?Hubble, Compton Gamma Ray, Spitzer, Chandra X-ray?and many other space observation projects. Europe and China are following, but their efforts are relatively minor. Why? The answer can be found in the words of U.S. President Joe Biden. On the 11th (local time), President Biden held a pre-release event at the White House for JWST’s observation images, stating, "This telescope shows that the United States is leading the world not by ‘power’ but by the ‘power of example.’" He especially emphasized, "These (JWST) images will remind people worldwide that America can achieve great things, and especially remind our children that nothing is impossible."

This means that the U.S. is pouring billions of dollars into astronomy and space observation, including launching space telescopes, to showcase its technology and national power to the world while instilling a spirit of challenge and dreams in children. In short, it is about adventure and the spirit of challenge. On the other hand, the core reason South Korea recently scrapped its asteroid Apophis exploration plan, which was under 300 billion won, was "not knowing why it should be done."

The publicly released images from JWST are vividly colorful and fantastic. However, we cannot see such a universe with our naked eyes. JWST detects mid-infrared and near-infrared light?wavelengths that are longer and travel farther?through its 6.5-meter primary mirror and transmits that data to Earth. The images released by NASA are processed data, color-coded so that shorter wavelengths appear blue and longer wavelengths appear red.

NASA announced that the purpose of JWST’s launch is to observe the early universe shortly after the Big Bang, monitor the life cycles of stars and galaxies including their formation, growth, and death, and search for evidence of extraterrestrial life. The first released image of the SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster captured light from galaxies estimated to have formed 300 to 400 million years after the Big Bang, thanks to the ‘gravitational lensing’ effect caused by the cluster’s massive gravity distorting light beyond it. The atmospheric analysis results of the exoplanet WASP-96b, where the presence of water was confirmed, are directly linked to the mission of searching for signs of life. The Carina Nebula represents star birth, the Southern Ring Nebula represents star death, and Stephan’s Quintet is the most appropriate image showing galaxy interactions and mergers.

How did JWST scientists detect water vapor on a distant exoplanet? They conducted spectroscopic observations of starlight as the planet WASP-96b passed in front of its star. In other words, they utilized the fact that starlight passing through the planet’s atmosphere acquires different spectra depending on the atmospheric components, confirming the spectrum of water vapor in the starlight that passed through WASP-96b’s atmosphere.