New NIRCam Wisp Templates Are Now Available

August 7, 2024

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Wisps are faint, diffuse stray light features that are fixed in detector space and show up with variable brightness in all NIRCam exposures. They are caused by light bouncing off of the primary mirror support strut before hitting the detector. The NIRCam team has released Version 3 of the Wisp Templates, which incorporates almost two more years of data than Version 2. The new templates have ~50% less noise than Version 2 (see Figure 1) and are available for all wide and medium band short wavelength filters, except F070W. To access the templates and for more details about this feature, see the NIRCam Scattered Light Artifacts JDox article. Users with questions are encouraged to contact the NIRCam team via the JWST Help Desk.

Comparison of Wisps Templates
Figure 1: The image above shows the previous version of the templates in F150W for detectors A3, A4, B3, and B4 (left) and the new templates (right).

 

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The NASA James Webb Space Telescope, developed in partnership with ESA and CSA, is operated by AURA’s Space Telescope Science Institute.