CURRENT AFFAIRS

Detailed explanation-1: -After nearly 16 years of exploring the cosmos in infrared light, NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope will be switched off permanently on Jan. 30, 2020.

Detailed explanation-2: -Spitzer’s prime mission came to an end in 2009, when the telescope exhausted its supply of the liquid helium coolant necessary for operating two of its three instruments – the Infrared Spectrograph (IRS) and Multiband Imaging Photometer for Spitzer (MIPS).

Detailed explanation-3: -The James Webb Space Telescope will soon replace existing Hubble Space Telescope. Spitzer, NASA’s first infrared Great Observatory, led the way for Webb’s larger primary mirror & improved detectors to see the infrared sky with even more clarity.

Detailed explanation-4: -The Spitzer Space Telescope, launched in 2003, was NASA’s Infrared Great Observatory. Among many other accomplishments in its 16 years of operation, Spitzer discovered a giant ring of Saturn, revealed a system of seven Earth-size planets around a star 40 light-years away, and studied the most distant known galaxies.

Detailed explanation-5: -The Spitzer Space Telescope, formerly the Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF), was an infrared space telescope launched in 2003. Operations ended on 30 January 2020. Spitzer was the third space telescope dedicated to infrared astronomy, following IRAS (1983) and ISO (1995–1998).