Madrid, 23 ago. (Europe Press) –
NASA has begun assembling and testing the electrical wiring, or harness, of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. This allows different parts of the lab to communicate with each other.
In addition, the harness provides power and a central computer helps monitor the tracking function through a series of sensors. This brings the mission one step closer to studying billions of cosmic objects. Unravel mysteries like dark energy upon its release in May 2027.
“Just as the nervous system carries signals throughout the human body, Roman’s harness connects its components, providing power and commands to every electronic box and instrument,” he said. It is a statement Deneen Ferro, Development Lead for the Roman Saddle Program at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. “No harness, no shuttle.”
Weighing around 450 kg, the harness is made up of approximately 32,000 wires and 900 connectors. If the cables are laid end to end, they will span 72 kilometers. directed upwards, They reach eight times the height of Mount Everest.
To build it, over about two years, a team of 11 Goddard technicians spent time on benches and ladders, cutting wires to length, Meticulously cleans each component and reassembles everything.
The entire harness was built into a dummy observation system before being transported to Goddard’s Space Environment Simulator, a large thermal vacuum chamber used in this case for backpacking.
When observatories like Roman are sent into space, the resulting vacuum and orbital temperatures can cause some materials to release harmful vapors, which then condense into electronics, creating problems such as short circuits or deposits on sensitive optics, reducing the telescope’s performance. Bakeout releases these gases to Earth So they are not emitted inside the spacecraft while in space.
Now, engineers will weave the harness through the aircraft system in Goddard’s large clean room. This process continues until most parts of the spacecraft are assembled. Meanwhile, Goddard’s team will soon begin installing the electronics boxes that will eventually power all of the spacecraft’s science instruments through the harness.
Roman, Its release is expected in 2027, is a next-generation observatory that spans vast space and time to study the infrared universe. Thanks to the mission’s enormous field of view and fast scan speed, astronomers will be able to observe thousands of planets, millions of galaxies, and billions of stars.
Astronomers believe that Roman reveals a considerable number of rocky worlds within and beyond the zone where liquid water may exist. The mission’s observations will help shed light on two of the biggest cosmic mysteries: dark energy and dark matter.
