The James Webb Space Telescope model is flying to Germany

The James Webb Space Telescope Full-Scale model at its appearance at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Click here for more information.

The model of the James Webb Space Telescope has been making a lot of "orbits" around the world, and is now slated to "land" at the Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany from October 13-28, 2008.

The actual James Webb Space Telescope is in the process of being built. Once it launches in 2013 it will find the first galaxies and will peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems, connecting the Milky Way to our own Solar System. Webb's instruments have been designed to work primarily in the infrared range of the electromagnetic spectrum, with some capability in the visible range.

In the meantime, a life-sized model of the Webb telescope was built by Northrop Grumman to give the viewing public here on Earth a better understanding of the size, scale and complexity of this breakthrough satellite. Northrop Grumman Corporation, Redondo Beach, Calif. and many other U.S. and international partners are working with NASA to build the actual telescope and technologies.

The Deutsches Museum in Munich, Germany has over 100,000 objects from the fields of science and technology. The exhibits and collections cover all areas of science and technology from mining to atomic physics, to biology. They extend from the Stone Age to the present time. Collecting historically significant objects is still one of the Museum's central tasks, and the Webb telescope model makes a nice temporary exhibit to showcase the next generation of space telescopes.