The Roman Space Telescope will settle essential questions in the areas of dark energy, exoplanets, and astrophysics. The telescope is named after NASA’s first chief astronomer, Nancy Grace Roman, sometimes called the ‘mother of the Hubble Space Telescope.’
Roman Space Telescope will function as Hubble’s wide-eyed cousin. It’s just as sensitive as Hubble's cameras, but the Roman Space Telescope's will image a sky area 100 times larger.
It will operate from in a orbit around Lagrange point (L2). About 1 million miles directly behind Earth, away from the Sun. At this point, gravity and the pull of orbit balance out. This lets a spacecraft move around the Sun at the same speed as Earth. The James Webb Space Telescope and Euclid space telescope are there now.
The Roman Space Telescope will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center. Liftoff is no earlier than Sunday, August 30th at 7:26AM.
WFIT's Rick Glasby has this overview of the mission:
