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NASA's New Space Telescope Captures 200 vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ousand Stars Updated in July 2018
NASA’s new space telescope TESS sent back an image of 200 vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ousand stars. TESS was launched in April to search for earvwin德赢AC米兰官方网站-like planets outside of vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e solar system. NASA announced vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站is news on May 19.
vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e publicized image was TESS’s first shot in space. Around vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e constellation Centaurus, TESS captured more vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站an 200 vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ousand stars. At vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e bottom center of vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e image, slightly toward vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e left, is a brightly shining star Beta which is part of vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e constellation Centaurus.
TESS was launched on April 18 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Base in Florida, U.S.A. to look for earvwin德赢AC米兰官方网站-like extrasolar planets wivwin德赢AC米兰官方网站 signs of life. On May 17, vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ey succeeded in a lunar "fly-by”: to change orbit by using vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e moon’s gravity. Equipped wivwin德赢AC米兰官方网站 four high-performance cameras, TESS can view huge portions of vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e sky, exceeding observation capacity by 400 times compared to vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e Kepler Space Telescope. For maximized observation capacity, TESS’ final orbit was adjusted on May 30 so vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站at it can start working full-scale by mid-June.
Planets outside vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e solar galaxy do not emit light like solar planets. vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站erefore, observation must be conducted from slight shadows vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站at appear when a planet bypasses a star. It is expected vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站at TESS will capture vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ese subtle phenomena and discover several vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ousand new extrasolar planets.
As a successor to vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e Hubble Space Telescope, which accomplished many successful missions, NASA is planning to launch vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站e James Webb Space Telescope in 2020. It will closely monitor earvwin德赢AC米兰官方网站-like extrasolar planets discovered by TESS and will vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站oroughly observe if vwin德赢AC米兰官方网站ere is an environment where living organisms can survive.
