Beyond Hubble: The James Webb Space Telescope & The Search for Life in the Universe

For over twenty-three years the Hubble Space Telescope has been a centerpiece of modern astronomy. Today, it is regarded as one of the most important scientific instruments that humans have every built. Using Hubble's amazing images, I will show why the New York Times described Hubble as having "taught us to see the properties of a universe humans have been able, for most of their history, to probe only with their thoughts." With the hugely successful but last Hubble servicing mission in May 2009 now behind us, attention is now turning to Hubble's successor, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). JWST will be the size of a tennis court, be launched 1 million miles into space, and be 100x more powerful than Hubble and all previous telescopes.  I will describe the design and technology behind this audacious "Hubble 2.0", and outline a prescription to use it and other telescopes to answer the fundamental question, "are we alone?".

Speaker: Dr. Jason Kalirai, Project Scientist Space - Telescope Science Institute