The Spitzer telescope retires, has seen the baby universe

After seeing the birth of stars and planets when the universe was still very young, NASA's Spitzer telescope retires after 17 years of activity, leaving an important legacy, with images and data that for years will still give a lot of work to astronomers and astrophysicists. His infrared images have captured stars still wrapped in their own cocoon of gas and dust and cradles of planets. The latter features the Tarantula Nebula, photographed in two wavelengths.

The nebula is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, one of the nearby galaxies of the Milky Way, and is a nursery of stars. "Spitzer has taught us a lot about the universe, helping us understand our origins," said Thomas Zurbuchen, one of the managers of the space telescope. "Its scientific impact - he added - will certainly extend well beyond the conclusion of the mission".

Launched in 2003, the telescope has studied both the surroundings of the Solar System and the deep universe. For example, he observed comet Tempel 1, the target of NASA's Deep Impact mission in 2005. Spitzer also discovered the largest ring surrounding Saturn made of ice and dust. The telescope was among the first to study planets outside the Solar System, helping to discover the seven Earth-like worlds of the Trappist-1 system. He also observed newborn stars and discovered soccer ball-shaped carbon molecules, called fullerenes, in interstellar space.

Spitzer's place will be taken by the James Webb space telescope, which is scheduled to launch in 2021. Made thanks to a collaboration between the space agencies of the United States, Europe and Canada, the James Webb will also scan the cosmos in infrared, going chasing life on other worlds.