As a result, a Roman Ultra Deep Field would collect millions of galaxies, including hundreds that date back to just a few hundred million years after the big bang.
One of the Hubble Space Telescope’s most iconic images is the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, which unveiled myriad galaxies across the universe, stretching back to within a few hundred million years of the Big Bang.NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will be able to photograph an area of the sky at least 100 times larger than Hubble with the same crisp sharpness.Among the many observations that will be enabled by this wide view of the cosmos, astronomers are considering the possibility and scientific potential of a Roman Space Telescope “ultra-deep field.†Such an observation could reveal new insights into subjects ranging from star formation during the universe’s youth to the way galaxies cluster together in space.
A Roman ultra deep field could greatly benefit the scientific community, say astronomers.
“As a community science concept, there could be exciting science returns from ultra-deep field observations by Roman.As an example, a Roman ultra-deep field could be similar to the Hubble Ultra Deep Field – looking in a single direction for a few hundred hours to build up an extremely detailed image of very faint, distant objects.Those galaxies are also the rarest: for example, only a handful are seen in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field.
Malhotra is a co-investigator on the Roman science investigation teams working on cosmic dawn, and has led programs that do deep spectroscopy with Hubble, to learn about distant, young galaxies?
A Roman ultra-deep field would contain information on millions of galaxies – far too many to be studied by researchers one at a time.Hubble Ultra Deep Field
AURA’s Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations