NASA Completes Giant Mirrors for Webb Space Telescope

In September 2011 engineers completed coating of James Webb's 21 mirror segments with microscopic layers of gold.

NASA's next huge space telescope passed a major mirror milestone this week on its path to become the world's most powerful space observatory when it launches in 2018.

Engineers completed coating 21 mirrors that will make up NASA's flagship James Webb Space Telescope with the thin — but vital — layer of gold that will reflect the faint infrared light collected by the observatory from the most distant reaches of the universe.

"It represents not just the coating event but the completion of a huge engineering project," John Mather, the telescope's senior project scientist, stated. "The mirrors are spectacularly new technology."