After astronauts install the Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) during SM4, it will continue the pioneering tradition of previous Hubble cameras, but with critical improvements to take the telescope on a new voyage of discovery. Together with the new Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS), WFC3 will lead the way to many more exciting scientific discoveries.
Instrument Overview
WFC3 will study a diverse range of objects and phenomena, from young and extremely distant galaxies, to much more nearby stellar systems, to objects within our very own solar system. Its key feature is its ability to span the electromagnetic spectrum from the ultraviolet (UV, the kind of radiation that causes sunburn), through visible/ optical light (what our eyes can detect), and into the near infrared (NIR, the kind of radiation seen with night-vision goggles). WFC3 extends Hubble’s capability not only by seeing deeper into the universe but also by providing wide-field imagery in all three regions of the spectrum—UV-Visible-NIR. It is this wide-field “panchromatic” coverage of that makes WFC3 so unique. As an example, WFC3 will observe young, hot stars (glowing predominantly in UV) and older, cooler stars (glowing predominantly in the red and NIR) in the same galaxy.
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