22 Things to Look Forward to in
Like last year at this time, the very best we can hope for in 2022 is an end to the pandemic that has caused such devastation in the world over the past 22 months. If we’ve learned anything from our experiences in 2021, though—first with the Delta variant and now Omicron—it is that we can’t count on anything when it comes to the COVID-19 virus. Rather than bet on a return to pre-pandemic normalcy, we need to create a different normal in which we remain vigilant about the health risks while finding safe, productive ways to work, play, mix, mingle and be happy that are rooted in our new reality. Fortunately, the early signs are that 2022 has a lot to offer to help us do that, to make that new reality interesting, innovative, informative and, at least some of the time, just plain fun. From space to sports, business to the arts, health to technology, here is a sampling of some of the things that could make 2022 a very happy New Year.
A VIEW OF THE EARLY UNIVERSE
By midsummer, if all goes well, the James Webb Telescope will be peering backward in time to the first few hundred million years of the universe and sending back images of the first stars and galaxies forming from the maelstrom of the Big Bang.
The Webb is the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, which has been delivering spectacular images since 1993. Hubble was a huge improvement over ground-based telescopes because its position in low-Earth orbit put it above the image-distorting atmosphere. Webb goes a step further: It will sit a million miles away in a “Lagrange” point, gravitationally suspended between the Earth and the sun, protected from the sun’s heat by a tarp that will (fingers crossed) unfurl to the size of a tennis court.
Being so far from Earth means that the Webb’s highly sensitive equipment can be kept cool enough to pick up faint signals from the early universe. Whereas Hubble looked mainly at light in the visible range (as well as some infrared and ultraviolet), the sensors on the Webb are tuned to lower-frequency “red-shifted” light. That is crucial to the
