The last launch for NASA this year is the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) scheduled for December 9th. The spacecraft will be launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and enter into a polar orbit around Earth. The science instrument was built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Utah. The science instrument has to be kept very cold to work properly. Using 2 hydrogen tanks that encircle it, the science instrument is chilled to -445° F. The spacecraft was built by Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corporation in Colorado. The mission is managed by the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland under NASA’s Explorers Program.

The mission of WISE is to scan the entire sky 1½ times in a period of 9 months and uncover hidden cosmic objects, including the coolest stars, dark asteroids, and the most luminous galaxies. WISE will map the entire sky at 4 infrared wavelengths, with sensitivity hundreds to hundreds of thousands of times greater than earlier infrared scanning equipment could detect. WISE will be able to map hundreds of millions of objects. Millions of those objects have never been seen before.

The data will be used as navigation charts for other missions, allowing them to study the most unusual objects. NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, the European Space Agency’s Herschel Space Observatory, and NASA’s upcoming Sofia and James Webb Space Telescope will use the information found by WISE.