NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope has officially launched on its mission to explore dark matter, dark energy and other mysteries of the universe. The space telescope, capable of imaging swaths of the sky 100 times larger than what Hubble could capture, launched this morning from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on a Space X Falcon Heavy rocket. NASA confirmed shortly after launch that Roman had successfully deployed its solar panels and lower instrument sun shade. Over the coming days and weeks, the rest of its instruments will deploy and activate. Once fully operational, NASA says Roman will send home 1.4 terabytes of data a day. Its first images are expected to arrive in early 2027.

"Roman will be a discovery machine that will bring us closer than ever before to answering humanity's most profound questions about our cosmic history," said Nicky Fox, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. "With its large field of view and fast survey speeds, Roman will usher us into a new era of discovery and make the invisible visible, setting the foundation for humanity's search for life beyond our solar system."

In addition to investigating dark matter and dark energy, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will observe exoplanets and planet-forming discs. NASA says it may measure light from a billion galaxies over the duration of its mission.