China to launch huge Xuntian space telescope as early as 2024

China's first large space telescope, named Xuntian, will begin scientific work in about two years. About it writes CGTN.

One of the key differences between the Xuntian and the telescope "James Webb” is its location. The Chinese apparatus will be located much closer to the Earth - in the same orbit as the Chinese space station, and not at the Lagrange 2 point 1.5 million km from our planet.

The approximate lifetime of the telescope will be 10 years, but with proper care of the apparatus, it can serve science much longer. For example, the same Hubble has been operating for 32 years.

The dimensions of Xuntian are comparable to those of a bus, and it will weigh more than 10 tons. Also, the telescope will be able to attach to the module of the Chinese space station for maintenance and instrument replacement.

The telescope will be equipped with five observation devices, including a terahertz module, a multichannel imager, an integrated field spectrograph, a planetary coronagraph, and the Xuntian head module, which will carry out the bulk of observations of space objects.

Despite the fact that Xuntian and Hubble have the same resolution of 2.5 billion pixels, the Chinese telescope will have a field of view 300 times larger than its American counterpart.

Scientists believe that within 10 years of work, Xuntian will be able to explore about 40% of the sky. The launch of the telescope should take place in 2024.