could be many other planets out there with the ability to sustain life. as nasa put it this is an apollo moment. webb will fundamentally alter our understanding of the universe. it will be six months before we see any images from the telescope. while the launch was successful there is a lot that could go wrong between now and then. the telescope took 30 years to develop and involves what nasa calls giant high tech origami. it was a sun shield that will eventually reach the size of a tennis court. the telescope was folded up to fit into the rocket and throughout the next few weeks will start to unfurl. it is an exciting but harrowing time during which thousands of parts and sequences all have to work correctly together almost a million miles from earth. so far everything has gone according to plan. the past few days with the successful deployment of the antenna and telescope making its first planned adjustment to its trajectory. just moments ago nasa announced more good news that it
finally, the material is pulled taut, and the five layers of the sun shield, each as thin as a human hair, separate. the whole process has been rehearsed again and again on earth, but doing this in space will be nail biting. it s made of floppy material and it has to be held onto by a series of pins, which release one by one, pull it out, make it tight, release another bit, pull it out again, until slowly, over days, you pull out this tennis court sized object. so, for many people working on the project, that s where the real nerves are. the sun shield protects the telescope from the heat and light of the sun. the difference between the hot and cold sides is huge 300 degrees celsius. the telescope needs to operate in the coldest and darkest conditions to see the most distant stars. for the first time, we ll be able to see all the way back to the time when these very first galaxies formed. and that will allow us
at 6.5m wide, it s a massive bit of kit and crucial to the telescope working for years to come. 0ur science editor rebecca morelle explains. travelling through space and getting ready for its mission to begin, the james webb space telescope successfully launched nearly two weeks ago. it s a successor to hubble and will revolutionise our view of the universe. webb has the potential to blow people away, even people who are used to hubble. and i know that s hard to imagine, but the instruments are so powerful, the telescope is so powerful, almost anywhere we look, we re going to be breaking new ground in a huge way. the telescope is so big, to get into space, it had to be folded up like origami. it s been busy unfurling. first, its sun shield, which of the size of a tennis court. but now, a vital stage of the process is beginning. the mirror is the most important part of the telescope. its two folded sides open up and lock into place.
a golden opportunity may be lost. this is the most fundamental change in decades. many farmers i speak to are worried, what about our prime job, they say which is to produce food? they worry prices may have to go up. we welcome the increase in payment levels that will truly reward farmers for taking part in countryside stewardship and delivering for the environment and that is something we really do welcome, but we do need more detail to know how this fits alongside sustainable food production, how it will work for the tenanted sector and how it will underpin domestic food supply. agriculture is devolved. this is the direction england is taken. it is largely up to the nation is whether to follow or not. it is a balancing act between the needs of humans and the needs of nature. claire marshall, bbc news. having successfully completed the unfolding of its sun shield, the james webb space telescope is now manoeuvring its primary mirror into position.
reporter: a christmas launch from south america. the new $10 billion james webb space telescope, its ultimate holiday light display. moments later, real time images with the telescope making its way into deep space. now taking its first steps in pursuit of cosmological discovery. reporter: it begins a two-week process to deploy the antennas, mirrors and sun shield. james webb has its array out. reporter: it is 100 times more powerful than the hubble telescope before it, and will orbit the sun nearly a million miles away from earth. scientists will get deeper look into the universe capturing light so far that the lens will show images of what happened 13 billion years into the past, maybe even from the beginning of the universe we are going to discover incredible things that we never imagined reporter: the new seven ton telescope