IYA News

NASA's WISE will Map the Universe in Infrared

NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, is a low-Earth-orbit telescope scheduled for launch in December 2009. Over a six-month period, WISE will survey the whole sky at infrared wavelengths (3-23 microns, i.e., 4-33 times longer than wavelengths visible to the human eye) with far greater sensitivity than any previous mission or program. The telescope will unveil the mysteries of near-Earth asteroids, the coldest and nearest stars, regions of new star and planet formation in our Galaxy, the most luminous galaxies in the Universe, and quasars possibly near the cosmic horizon.

Dr. Ned Wright (UCLA) is the principal investigator of the WISE mission. Women play several prominent roles in the mission as its program scientist at NASA, deputy project scientist, payload manager, spacecraft program manager, etc.

You can find WISE-related education material and information here.

 

 

 

 

Monthly Feature

During each month of the International Year of Astronomy, we'll highlight some key NASA missions, space science discoveries, and night-sky wonders that you can discover with your own observations and explorations, and we'll connect you to related NASA resources and events.

Join us each month of 2009 as we explore:

2009	» Hot Topics	» Go Observe!
January	Telescopes and Space Probes: Today's Starry Messengers	Venus
February	Our Solar System	The Moon
March	Observing at Night... and in the Day	Saturn
April	Galaxies and the Distant Universe	The Whirlpool Galaxy
May	Our Sun	The Sun
June	Clusters of Stars	The Hercules Cluster
July	Black Holes	Our Galaxy: the Milky Way
August	Rocks and Ice in the Solar System	Perseids
September	Planets and Moons	Jupiter
October	What is the Fate of the Universe?	Andromeda
November	The Lives of Stars	The Crab Nebula
December	Discovering New Worlds	The Orion Nebula

Additional News

Additional IYA related News & Events can be found on the official IYA News and Press Releases pages.