NASA launches Roman Space Telescope on mission to explore dark energy and exoplanets
NASA launched the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on Sunday from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, marking the start of a mission to explore dark energy, dark matter, and exoplanets. The telescope lifted off at 7:26 a.m. ET aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A, reaching orbit about 10 minutes later.
The observatory, named after Nancy Grace Roman (1925–2018), the first chief of astronomy at NASA and a key figure in the development of the Hubble Space Telescope, is designed to operate for at least five years, with potential for a 10-year lifespan. It will travel to the second Lagrange point (L2), approximately 1.6 million kilometers from Earth, a journey expected to take around 100 days. The $4.3 billion project faced funding threats last year when the Trump administration proposed cuts to NASA’s science program, but Congress ultimately rejected the reductions.
The telescope’s wide-field instrument will survey the universe with a field of view at least 100 times greater than Hubble’s, enabling it to map the Milky Way in a single month—a task that would take Hubble a century. It will observe over 2 billion galaxies, measure cosmic expansion, and use a coronagraph to detect exoplanets by blocking starlight. NASA officials said Roman will complement the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes, with each mission providing distinct capabilities.
Nicky Fox, director of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, called the launch a pivotal moment. “Roman is exactly the type of success story we want to see across NASA,” she said. Jared Isaacman, NASA administrator, added that the mission was delivered ahead of schedule and within budget, reflecting over a decade of work by NASA and industry partners.
The first stage of the Falcon Heavy rocket returned to Earth for a controlled landing 15 minutes after liftoff, while the second stage separated from the spacecraft at 14:06 Spanish peninsular time, confirming the telescope’s trajectory toward L2. Scientists expect Roman to generate a catalog of celestial objects larger than any existing database, with observations in infrared light providing insights into the early universe.
Data from the telescope will be made available to researchers and the public worldwide. The mission will coordinate with other observatories, including the Rubin Telescope in Chile and the European Space Agency’s Euclid probe, to test current theories about the structure and evolution of the universe .
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NASA lança maior telescópio espacial para explorar universo O lançamento realizou-se às 07h26 hora do leste dos Estados Unidos (12h26 em Lisboa) a partir do Centro Espacial Kennedy da NASA, na Florida.
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