Focus Groups for Solar System Investigations with the JWST
Abstract
The unprecedented sensitivity and angular resolution of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will make it NASA’s premier space-based facility for infrared astronomy. This 6.5-meter telescope, which is optimized for observations in the near and mid infrared, will be equipped with four state-of-the-art instruments that include imaging, spectroscopy, and coronagraphy. These instruments, along with the telescope’s moving target capabilities, will enable the infrared study of solar system objects with unprecedented detail. A new white paper (Norwood et al., 2014) provides a general overview of JWST observatory and instrument capabilities for Solar System science, and updates and expands upon an earlier study by Lunine et al. (2010). In order to fully realize the potential of JWST for Solar System observations, we have recently organized 10 focus groups to explore various science use cases in more detail on topics including: Asteroids, Comets, Giant Planets, Mars, Near Earth Objects, Occultations, Rings, Satellites, Titan, and Trans-Neptunian Objects. The findings from these groups will help guide the project as it develops and implements planning tools, observing templates, the data pipeline and archives so that they enable a broad range of Solar System Science investigations. The purpose of this presentation is to raise awareness of the JWST Solar System planning, and to invite participation of DPS members with our Focus Groups and other pre-launch activities.References:Lunine, J., Hammel, H., Schaller, E., Sonneborn, G., Orton, G., Rieke, G., and Rieke, M. 2010, JWST Planetary Observations within the Solar System, http://www.stsci.edu/jwst/doc-archive/white-papers.Norwood, J., Hammel, H., Milam, S.,Stansberry, J., Lunine, J., Chanover, N., Hines, D., Sonneborn, G., Tiscareno, M., Brown, M. and Ferruit, P., 2014, ArXiv e-prints, 1403.6845.
- Publication:
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AAS/Division for Planetary Sciences Meeting Abstracts #46
- Pub Date:
- November 2014
- Bibcode:
- 2014DPS....4621421H