Alien Planet Safari
Thursday, January 14, 2010 - 17:14
in Astronomy & Space
The premiere observatory of the next decade, the James Webb Space Telescope, will launch in 2014 in search of "big game"--namely, the first stars and galaxies ever formed in our Universe. But the "little game" could turn out to be just as interesting. There's a dawning awareness among astronomers that the world's largest infrared telescope is going to be a canny hunter of planets circling faraway stars.