Paper
12 July 2008 Science with an 8-meter to 16-meter optical/UV space telescope
Marc Postman, Tom Brown, Anton Koekemoer, Mauro Giavalisco, Stephen Unwin, Wesley Traub, Daniela Calzetti, William Oegerle, Michael Shull, Steve Kilston, H. Phillip Stahl
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
A key component of our 2008 NASA Astrophysics Strategic Mission Concept Study entitled "An Advanced Technology Large-Aperture Space Telescope: A Technology Roadmap for the Next Decade" is the identification of the astrophysics that can be uniquely accomplished using a filled, large-aperture UV/optical space telescope with an angular resolution 5 - 10 times better than JWST. We summarize here four research areas that are amongst the prime drivers for such an advanced astronomical facility: 1) the detection of habitability and bio-signatures on terrestrial mass exoplanets, 2) the reconstruction of the detailed history of the assembly of stellar mass in the local universe, 3) establishing the mass function and characterizing the accretion environments of supermassive black holes out to redshifts of z ~ 7, and 4) the precise determination of growth of structure in the universe by kinematic mapping of the dark matter halos of galaxies as functions of time and environment.
© (2008) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Marc Postman, Tom Brown, Anton Koekemoer, Mauro Giavalisco, Stephen Unwin, Wesley Traub, Daniela Calzetti, William Oegerle, Michael Shull, Steve Kilston, and H. Phillip Stahl "Science with an 8-meter to 16-meter optical/UV space telescope", Proc. SPIE 7010, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2008: Optical, Infrared, and Millimeter, 701021 (12 July 2008); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.787881
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Cited by 21 scholarly publications.
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KEYWORDS
Space telescopes

Galactic astronomy

Telescopes

Stars

Exoplanets

Planets

James Webb Space Telescope

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