The Spitzer Space Telescope: Science Return and Impact
Abstract
The Spitzer Space Telescope is NASA’s Great Observatory for infrared astronomy. It was launched on August 25, 2003 after a more than three decade gestation. As a cryogenic mission it operated from 3-160 microns and included imaging and spectroscopy. Its cryogenic mission ended on May 15, 2009 when the last of its superfluid Helium evaporated. Since then Spitzer has operated in its “warm” phase, where the 3.6 and 4.5 micron imaging channels continue to operate at full sensitivity. Spitzer has made major discoveries in virtually all areas of astrophysics, ranging from the first direct detection of light from a planet orbiting another star and obtaining the first thermal infrared spectrum of an exoplanet, to identifying the most distant galaxies known. Spitzer observations have defined the timescale of planetary system formation, as well as the timescale for buildup of stellar mass in galaxies. Its spectroscopic observations have discovered water raining down on forming planetary systems and buckyballs in space as well as tracing aromatic molecules in dusty galaxies to look-back times of ~ 12 Gyr. Its most important contributions were not anticipated before its launch, with the most striking example being its major impact on exoplanet studies, itself an area that was unknown when the mission was being formulated and designed. In this talk I will describe a few of the major scientific contributions of the Spitzer mission to astrophysics, and its impact on the field. I will also describe the prospects for future contributions in the Spitzer Warm mission, which will extend through at least the end of 2014.
- Publication:
-
American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts #221
- Pub Date:
- January 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013AAS...22110101S