Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite
Encyclopedia
Small Explorer program
The Small Explorer program is an effort within NASA to fund space exploration missions that cost no more than $120 million.- Program history :...
within NASA
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...
. Investigators at Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory is a research institute of the Smithsonian Institution headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where it is joined with the Harvard College Observatory to form the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics .-History:The SAO was founded in 1890 by...
and Goddard Space Flight Center
Goddard Space Flight Center
The Goddard Space Flight Center is a major NASA space research laboratory established on May 1, 1959 as NASA's first space flight center. GSFC employs approximately 10,000 civil servants and contractors, and is located approximately northeast of Washington, D.C. in Greenbelt, Maryland, USA. GSFC,...
designed the telescope and the spacecraft, respectively.
The satellite examined microwaves from 487–556 GHz that originated in water molecules, molecular oxygen, atomic carbon, and carbon monoxide in space. This corresponds to wavelengths of about 0.54 to 0.61 millimeters (540 to 610 μm).
SWAS observed a unique area of the spectrum alternately described as submillimeter (for the wavelength of light seen), microwave, radio, and/or far infrared.
| Comparison | |||||||
| Name | Year | Wavelength | Aperture | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Human Eye | - | 0.39-0.75 μm | 0.01 m | ||||
| SWAS | 1998 | 540 - 610 μm | 0.55 - 0.7 | ||||
| Spitzer Spitzer Space Telescope The Spitzer Space Telescope , formerly the Space Infrared Telescope Facility is an infrared space observatory launched in 2003... |
2003 | 3-180 μm | 0.85 m | ||||
| Hubble Hubble Space Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation. A 2.4 meter aperture telescope in low Earth orbit, Hubble's four main instruments observe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared... WFC3 Wide Field Camera 3 The Wide Field Camera 3 is the Hubble Space Telescope's last and most technologically advanced instrument to take images in the visible spectrum... |
2009 | 0.2-1.7 μm | 2.4 m | ||||
| Herschel Herschel Space Observatory The Herschel Space Observatory is a European Space Agency space observatory sensitive to the far infrared and submillimetre wavebands. It is the largest space telescope ever launched, carrying a single mirror of in diameter.... |
2009 | 60-672 μm | 3.5 m | ||||