NASA, in signing a contract last month with TRW Inc to build the next-generation space telescope, has taken a big step toward peering at objects that are around 400 times fainter than are visible with current ground- or space-based telescopes. The move means that, after months of “blackout” associated with the NASA selection process, research groups can start working with the engineers on integrating the science instruments into the spacecraft, says Peter Jakobsen of the European Space Agency, a partner in the new observatory. The telescope has been named the James Webb Space Telescope, after NASA’s second administrator, who served in the 1960s.

The JWST design calls for at least six times the light-collecting area of the 2.4-meter Hubble Space Telescope (HST) but the same 0.1-arcsecond resolution. “The original requirements were chosen to complement the capabilities of other telescopes, both existing and planned,” says John Mather, JWST project scientist at...

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