WISE officially begins its mission to map the stars

by Stevie Smith - Dec 15 2009, 07:20

Launching successfully from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, NASA’s ambitious Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) has officially begun its mission to use infrared technology to better map surrounding galaxies, stars, and potentially dangerous asteroids.

Lifting off over the Pacific Ocean at approximately 06:09 PST (09:09 EST) aboard a Delta II rocket, the WISE spacecraft is presently residing in a stable orbit some 326 miles above the Earth after completing its separation procedure.

“WISE thundered overhead, lighting up the pre-dawn skies,” enthused William Irace, mission project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “All systems are looking good, and we are on our way to seeing the entire infrared sky better than ever before.”

The craft has now completed deployment of its solar panels for the generation of its own power, while valves on its cryostat chamber, which houses super-cold hydrogen required to cool the on-board WISE instrument, have also successfully opened.

According to the official NASA site, the instrument sees the infrared, or heat, signatures of objects, and therefore must be kept at extremely cold temperatures – its coldest detectors reach below minus 447 degrees Fahrenheit.

“WISE needs to be colder than the objects it’s observing,” outlined Ned Wright of UCLA, principal investigator on the mission. “Now we’re ready to see the infrared glow from hundreds of thousands of asteroids, and hundreds of millions of stars and galaxies.”

NASA officials have said WISE will now undergo a month of tests and calibration checks ahead of a high-resolution survey across nine months, during which time it will map the sky once, and then one-half again a second time. The craft’s primary mission will conclude when its supply of frozen hydrogen is depleted.

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