Revised calibrations for the James Webb Space Telescope’s instruments are bedevilling researchers studying the distant universe
Astronomers have been so keen to use the new James Webb Space Telescope that some have got a little ahead of themselves. Many started analysing Webb data right after the first batch was released, on 14 July, and quickly posted their results on preprint servers—but are now having to revise them. The telescope’s detectors had not been calibrated thoroughly when the first data were made available, and that fact slipped past some astronomers in their excitement.
Calibration is particularly challenging for projects that require precise measurements of the brightness of astronomical objects, such as faint, faraway galaxies. For several weeks, some astronomers have been cobbling together workarounds so that they can continue their analyses. The next official round of updates to Webb’s calibrations are expected in the coming weeks from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, which operates the telescope.
Calibration controversy All telescopes need to be calibrated. This is usually done by observing a well-understood star such as Vega, a prominent star in the night sky. Astronomers look at the data being collected by the telescope’s various instruments—such as the brightness of the star in different wavelengths of light—and compare them with measurements of the same star from other telescopes and of laboratory standards.
“This caused a little bit of panic,” says Nathan Adams, an astronomer at the University of Manchester, UK, who, along with his colleagues, pointed out the problem in a 9 August update to a preprint they had posted in late July.
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