NASA has scheduled a media briefing to discuss the
upcoming launch and mission of the Space Infrared Telescope
Facility (SIRTF).
The briefing is at 11 a.m. EST, Tuesday, March 25 in the
James Webb Auditorium, NASA Headquarters, 300 E Street SW,
Washington. The pre-launch briefing will consist of two
panels; the first will present a mission overview and the
second a science overview.
The briefing will be carried live on NASA Television, with
two-way question-and-answer capability for reporters at
participating NASA centers.
The Space Infrared Telescope Facility is scheduled for launch
Friday, April 18, from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station,
Fla., for a minimum two-and-one-half-year mission. It is the
final of NASA’s Great Observatories, which also include the
Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the
Compton Gamma Ray Observatory.
Participants in the mission briefing:
- Lia La Piana, Space Infrared Telescope Facility program executive, NASA Headquarters, Washington
- David Gallagher, Space Infrared Telescope Facility project manager, Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, Calif.
- Robert Wilson, Space Infrared Telescope Facility mission operations manager, JPL
- Mark Garcia, Space Infrared Telescope Facility mission engineer, JPL
- Suzanne Dodd, manager, Space Infrared Telescope Facility Science Center, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif.
Participants in the science briefing:
- Dr. Anne Kinney, director, astronomy/physics division, NASA Headquarters
- Dr. Michael Werner, Space Infrared Telescope Facility project scientist, JPL
- Dr. Alyssa Goodman, professor, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Mass.
- Dr. Belinda Wilkes, professor, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
- Dr. Garth Illingworth, professor, University of California, Santa Cruz, Calif.
- Dr. George Rieke, professor and principal investigator for the multiband-imaging photometer science instrument, University of Arizona, Tucson, Ariz.
The telescope’s unprecedented infrared sensitivity will allow
astronomers to investigate what they affectionately call “the
old, the cold and the dirty,” referring to the coldest,
oldest and most dust-obscured objects and processes in the
universe.
The observatory’s capability for observing low-temperature
objects will also aid in the search for planetary systems in
formation, some of which may nurture Earth-like planets.
NASA TV is broadcast on satellite AMC-2, transponder 9C, C
band, and 85 degrees west longitude. The frequency is 3880.0
MHz. Polarization is vertical and audio is monaural at 6.8
MHz.
The briefing will also be web cast live at:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/webcast/sirtf/30.cfm
For more information about the Space Infrared Telescope
Facility on the Internet, visit:
