NASA's next eye into the cosmos is due to leave our planet later this year. The agency says it's targeting an early September launch for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. Roman (for short) has a field of view 100 times larger than Hubble's. The September date is the earliest possible launch for Roman. NASA says it will go up (aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket ) no later than May 2027. The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, named after NASA's first chief astronomer and "mother" of Hubble , was introduced in 2016. (Back then, it was known as the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope, or WFIRST .) The telescope's mirror is roughly the same size as Hubble's, but it can capture sections of the sky at least 100 times larger than its predecessor. NASA "Roman will work in tandem with NASA observatories such as the James Webb Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory , which are designed to zoom in on rare transient objects once they've been identified, but seldom if ever discover them," Julie McEnery, Roman's senior project scientist, said in 2023. "Roman's much larger field of view will reveal many such objects that were previously unknown. And since we've never had an observatory like this scanning the cosmos before, we could even find entirely new classes of objects and events." After leaving our atmosphere, Roman will set course for a vantage point nearly 1 million miles from Earth. There, it will rely on a pair of instruments to study space. The first is a 300.8-megapixel camera that captures light from visible to near-infrared. There's also a high-contrast coronagraph that will allow it to capture exoplanets that would otherwise be blocked by starlight. Roman’s mission: "to settle essential questions in the areas of dark energy, exoplanets and astrophysics." Despite decades of study, astronomers know surprisingly little about dark energy , which makes up about 68 percent of the universe’s contents. And while scientific discoveries are cool and all, you’ll be pleased to know that Roman is also sure to beam back more dazzling pictures of our cosmos . This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/space/nasa-targets-a-september-launch-for-its-next-big-space-telescope-204140176.html?src=rss
Last year, Ecco the Dolphin creator Ed Annunizata teased plans to remaster the first two games in the series and create an entirely new sequel. Ecco the Dolphin: Complete , announced by Annunziata's studio A&R Atelier , appears to be the result of that work. The game doesn't have a release date yet, but A&R Atelier says it combines the planned remasters and third title into "the complete, definitive Ecco the Dolphin experience, created by the people who made the originals." Complete includes "all versions of Ecco the Dolphin and Ecco: The Tides of Time ," according to the developer, alongside "a brand-new contemporary Ecco game." Besides graphical improvements, A&E Atelier says the game will introduce "built-in speedrunning support, achievements and leaderboards," and things like the ability to create custom courses from existing levels. And while A&R Atelier's announcement doesn't include footage of the new game or the platforms it'll release on, the official Ecco the Dolphin website has a countdown clock that could point to when more information will be released. Annunziata sued Sega to try and win the rights to the Ecco the Dolphin IP in 2013, the same year he failed to get The Big Blue , a spiritual sequel to Ecco the Dolphin , fully funded on Kickstarter. Sega and Annunziata ultimately settled their lawsuit in 2016 , which may have laid the groundwork for Ecco the Dolphin: Complete to happen. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/ecco-the-dolphin-complete-will-combine-remasters-and-a-sequel-into-one-package-222020243.html?src=rss
