Dark energy, exoplanets and black holes: What Nasa’s new Roman telescope will explore

The launch of Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope was posted by @NASARoman on X. Nasa has launched its Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on a mission to investigate dark matter and dark energy, study black holes and search for planets beyond our solar system. The agency expects Roman's surveys to uncover roughly 100,000 new exoplanets.The telescope lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Sunday morning local time aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket. The rocket released Roman 31 minutes into the flight, sending the observatory on a three-month journey to its final orbit around the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point, or L2, about one million miles from Earth.Roman's Wide Field Instrument will allow scientists to examine far more of the sky in a single observation. Nasa says its field of view will be at least 100 times larger than Hubble's. Its distant location will also help Roman's infrared instruments. Astronomer Jenifer Millard told the British Broadcasting Corporation this is to make sure infrared light from the Moon and Earth does not interfere with the cameras."Roman is going to change the way we look at the Universe," said Nicky Fox, a Nasa administrator.Roman could ...