Who gets the first peek at the secrets of the universe?

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The James Webb Space Telescope is by far the most powerful space-based telescope ever deployed by the United States. It's three stories high, cost $10 billion, and uses a 6.5-meter mirror to observe objects 13 billion light years away.

But it is only one instrument, and scientists all over the world have to share. The JWST's managers received more than 1,600 research proposals for what the telescope should look at. Given the time limitations, the vast majority of them will be rejected.

When an astronomer or a team does get some much-coveted telescope time, they currently get exclusive access to whatever data they collect for a full year. After that, the data becomes public. But there is a movement in astronomy to make most results open-access right away, and the Biden Administration has signaled its agreement.

"The idea is, if its data was available much more quickly, astronomers would be better able to make use of it," says NPR's Nell Greenfieldboyce. That might speed up the pace of scientific discoveries and open up the data to a much wider set of researchers.

On the other hand, some astronomers worry that instant open access would mostly benefit researchers who already have advantages, such as funding, seniority, and institutional backing.

In this episode, Nell talks with Short Wave scientist in residence Regina G. Barber, who has firsthand experience competing for telescope time, about who gets dibs on the data, and how that could affect equity in astronomy.

Have questions about the universe or science policy? Let us know! Email shortwave@npr.org.

This episode was produced by Liz Metzger, edited by Gabriel Spitzer and fact-checked by Anil Oza. TK was the audio engineer.