How James Webb Orbits 'Nothing'

The James Webb Space Telescope is now in orbit around L2! But there's nothing there, so how can it orbit when there's nothing there? We'll show how JWST maintains its orbit around the second Lagrangian Point of the Sun and Earth.

00:00 Webb Enters Orbit
02:25 Magellan TV
02:59 Lagrangian Points Explained
04:29 Station Keeping at L2
07:00 How Webb Orbits L2
10:22 Webb's Actual Orbit and Trajectory
12:13 Maintaining Webb's Orbit

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Watch next: Solar Orbiter Discovers Surprising new Phenomenon in the Sun
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[lukeschroeder]

A little over a hundred years ago, humanity hadn’t yet made functioning airplanes. Now we have telescopes flying through space taking visible and infrared pictures and sending them back to earth. This is absolutely amazing!

[YuriiTheHuman]

The fact that this is so oversimplified and still pretty hard to grasp is scary. Such things are a major feat of human intelligence and hard work

[danielm]

I’m still in awe that scientists can figure out all of these computations, and get Webb to work as planned (after all of the computer simulations and rigorous testing) Seriously amazing! Thanks for the video to help explain all of this. I’ve been wondering how that L2 orbit works since seeing the animations.

[SnootchieBootchies]

I can only imagine how excited the team was to nail the burns so efficiently, and reward themselves with an extra decade with this amazing tool. All their hard work is really going to pay off for all of us!

[RCRDC_handlesarepoopoo]

"Until next time.. stay curious my friend."

That line comes across so genuine each time. I'm glad I found your channel, every video is so full of detail with a clear explanation. Thank you.

[greenredblue]

6:27 "JWST could use nuclear power, but that's expensive and hard to do."

Admit it, that's a pretty funny thing to say in a video about the JWST.

[jackwhitetron]

Im pretty well educated and have a doctorate. Watching videos like these is VERY humbling. The scientist and engineers that figure this stuff out are the true Rockstars of our society. 💙

[bravo-]

Your explanations simply cannot get any better. Crystal clear and informative

[fergulus]

You've done a fantastic job simplifying a complex topic into a digestible topic! I'm not an astrophysicist, and really appreciate the effort put into this. I've been wondering it offhand for months now.

[leandrotami]

I like how this explanation is quite within the grasp of students who are perhaps just in their first or second year of physics in college. While I haven't taken a physics or math class in more than 10 years, i'm happy that I (kind of) can follow what you're saying.

[lennyf]

Absolutely the best explanation I've heard about Webb's very complicated and complex orbit.

[BRNCC]

I've seen a lot of videos explaining JWST's orbit. This one is by far the most clear and easy to understand, and with great detail as well. Thank you!

[kandeepanbalasingam]

After several weeks of struggle, I finally understood how objects behave at the L2 point. Thanks a lot sir. You are simply amazing.

[afriendofafriend]

It's at a Lagrange point, so it does orbit something, it just happens to be that it stays in the same place in the frame of reference of the earth.

[SrFrancia]

That "stay curious my friend" at the end felt so genuine, thanks for the great explanation

[_spacyzuma]

Since the JWST was launched, I've been reading up on lagrange points and L2 halo orbits. I struggled to understand how a halo orbits works. This video is the best video I've seen that explained the physics behind it. Thank you so so much! You have a new subscriber and I will be sure to support your patreon.

[sailorgeer]

Thank you thank you thank you!! I’ve been trying to find an explanation of this “orbiting an empty spot” physics and have been stymied until now! As an engineer I’m familiar with vector forces and the basics of orbital mechanics but I could never understand where the centripetal acceleration toward L2 was coming from. Your animation showing the small frequent thrusts that continually push Webb up the gravitational “hill” toward L2 to counter the tendency to fall back toward earth was also brilliant and makes the whole thing much more intuitive!

[feelingzhakkaas]

ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL EXPLANATION . THIS DESERVES A BIG APPLAUSE AND AWARD. NO OTHER VIDEO HAS EVER EXPLAINED THIS WAY. GOD BLESS YOU SIR.

[Fishboneu]

Thanks for making an insanely complicated subject understandable for those of us not born with Einstein brains! I now understand the physics behind this now thanks to you. You just earned a subscriber!

[itissrinivasan]

My jaw dropped at how good that explanation was (based on how well and easily I was able to understand) Hats off !