Focusing Efforts

Gifts totaling over $50 million from an anonymous donor are helping researchers in the University of Arizona astronomy department develop technology that could make space telescope missions quicker, more efficient and more cost-effective. Specifically: “We’re working to build a six-and-a-half-meter space telescope,” says Buell Jannuzi, astronomy department head and Steward Observatory director.

Six-and-a-half meters: the same diameter as the James Webb Space Telescope. But, as Jannuzi points out, the mirrors for the Webb telescope had to fit inside a rocket with a four-meter diameter, “so they fold it up like a flower, and then when it gets into space, it expands.”

The idea now is to make a mirror that would fit into a new generation of larger rockets without having to fold. Reducing costs is one motive. Another is ensuring that U of A faculty can participate in these kinds of projects in meaningful ways at meaningful junctures in their careers.

“NASA missions are fantastic,” Jannuzi says. “I would not in any way want someone to think we don’t support the way NASA does things.” But if you’re a junior faculty member — “or more accurately, you’re the department head with a bunch of talented junior faculty,” he says, wryly — the long waits between big projects can feel deflating.

The key to the gift is risk — at least, more risk than a governmental organization like NASA is allowed. “The idea is to do a series of missions that would reuse the design of key components so that we can get some economy of scale,” Jannuzi says. Five years instead of 25 years, for example. “We’re in the early stages,” he says. “But they’re willing to fund the work.”