Scientific Discovery with the James Webb Space Telescope
  For the past 400 years, astronomers have sought to observe and interpret the
Universe by building more powerful telescopes. These incredible instruments
extend the capabilities of one of our most important senses, sight, towards new
limits such as increased sensitivity and resolution, new dimensions such as
exploration of wavelengths across the full electromagnetic spectrum, new
information content such as analysis through spectroscopy, and new cadences
such as rapid time-series views of the variable sky. The results from these
investments, from small to large telescopes on the ground and in space, have
completely transformed our understanding of the Universe; including the
discovery that Earth is not the center of the Universe, that the Milky Way is
one among many galaxies in the Universe, that relic cosmic background radiation
fills all space in the early Universe, that that the expansion rate of the
Universe is accelerating, that exoplanets are common around stars, that
gravitational waves exist, and much more. For modern astronomical research, the
next wave of breakthroughs in fields ranging over planetary, stellar, galactic,
and extragalactic science motivate a general-purpose observatory that is
optimized at near- and mid-infrared wavelengths, and that has much greater
sensitivity, resolution, and spectroscopic multiplexing than all previous
telescopes. This scientific vision, from measuring the composition of rocky
worlds in the nearby Milky Way galaxy to finding the first sources of light in
the Universe to other topics at the forefront of modern astrophysics, motivates
the state-of-the-art James Webb Space Telescope (Webb). In this review paper, I
summarize the design and technical capabilities of Webb and the scientific
opportunities that it enables.
