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[Music Throughout] The Wide

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[Music Throughout] The Wide

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Field Instrument is the heart of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.

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It is what allows the Roman Space Telescope to take pictures with the same detail

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as Hubble, but covering an area 100 times larger.

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Despite this incredible power, the basic design is the same as telescopes

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around the world. Light enters through Roman's 2.4-meter aperture

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and is reflected and focused by the curved main mirror,

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which is also the largest mirror in the telescope. This light

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is reflected and focused once more by the secondary mirror. More

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elements tighten the beam and strip it of stray light rays before it passes through

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the filter wheel. This wheel has a variety of filters that

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allow different wavelengths of light to pass through. It spins from one

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to another depending on what the researcher is looking for.

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Finally, the focused and filtered light reaches the focal plane, where it creates an

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image on the detectors. These detectors use the photoelectric effect 

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to convert photons into an electrical signal that is then decoded into

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an image. In Roman's case, there are 18 detectors,

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allowing it to create 300-million-pixel images of large patches

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of the sky.  The large number of detectors and

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pixels gives Roman its wide field of view. The size of the

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mirror and the precision of it optics gives Roman its fine imaging.

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This combination of image size and detail has never

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been possible on a space-based telescope before and will make the Nancy Grace

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Roman Space Telescope an indespensible tool in the future.

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Explore: Solar system & beyond. NASA