The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) Observatory is the follow-on mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. JWST will be the biggest space telescope ever built and it will lead to astounding scientific breakthroughs. The mission will be launched in October 2018 from Kourou, French Guyana by an ESA provided Ariane 5 rocket. NIRSpec, one of the four instruments on board of the mission, recently underwent a major upgrade. New infrared detectors were installed and the Micro Shutter Assembly (MSA) was replaced as well. The rework was necessary because both systems were found to be degrading beyond a level that could be accepted. The techniques and procedures that were applied during this campaign will be elaborated in this paper. Some first cold test results of the upgraded instrument will be presented as well.

Date Published: 29 July 2016
PDF: 15 pages
Proc. SPIE 9904, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2016: Optical, Infrared, and Millimeter Wave, 99040D (29 July 2016); doi: 10.1117/12.2232640

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9904:
Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2016: Optical, Infrared, and Millimeter Wave
Howard A. MacEwen; Giovanni G. Fazio; Makenzie Lystrup; Natalie Batalha; Nicholas Siegler; Edward C. Tong, Editor(s)