NIRSpec - Detecting radiation from the first galaxies
NIRSpec - Detecting radiation from the first galaxies
NIRSpec (Near Infrared Spectrograph) was built by Airbus in Ottobrunn and Friedrichshafen on behalf of ESA and is designed to observe radiation in the range from 0.6 to 5 micrometres. For the first time ever, this instrument will simultaneously record spectra from up to 100 different observation targets in a field of view of 3.4 by 3.6 arcminutes, making it ideal for the spectroscopy of distant galaxies. One arc minute corresponds roughly to the resolving power of our eye, with the full Moon in the sky corresponding to an extent of 32 arc minutes. NIRSpec is primarily intended to detect the radiation of the first galaxies that formed in the early Universe approximately 200 million years after the Big Bang, when space was still very different from what it is now.
