Today in Big Space Telescope News: What Comes After James Webb?

Talk about impatient. We've still got more than a year before the James Webb Space Telescope, Hubble's long-delayed successor, launches, but NASA's already talking about what comes next. It takes a long time to plan out these big flagship space missions, and the JWST comes with a big catch that Hubble didn't have. It's not serviceable. For one, if there's a problem with it right off the bat like there was with Hubble, we're in trouble, and secondly, it means we can't add on to it. That's why Hubble's lasted as long as it has. Hubble now is a completely different beast compared to when it launched in 1990. Here's a fun fact for you, the JWST is technically in violation of the law because it can't be serviced. Congress actually passed a law in 2010 about that. I guess the JWST was grandfathered in or something.

So anyway, what will succeed James Webb? The strongest contender is the Large UV/Optical/Infrared Survey (LUVOIR). But whatever comes next will be big, probably twice the size of the 6.5 meter telescope on the JWST. A telescope that big is needed for the search for habitable exoplanets. Sure, we've found lots of candidates and potential exoplanets, but for now, that's all they are. Potential. James Webb will be able to image a few, but there's no guarantee any of the worlds it'll probe will be Earth-like. At this point, we have no idea how common Earth-like planets are. Maybe it won't be a problem, but maybe it will. Maybe we'll need something bigger to increase our odds. Of course, the next massive space-based telescope will also do other things, such as take reasonable images of Pluto and Kuiper Belt objects.

Of course, all this is at least 10 years down the road, I'm sure, so don't hold your breath for anything. There's a quality conclusion right there.