Some vagueness about EventQueue and Event Dispatching Thread

Question

java.awt.EventQueue.invokeLater(new Runnable() {
    public void run() {
        new MyJFrame().setVisible(true);
    }
});

I often see the above code snippet in Java Swing GUI applications. The java.awt.EventQueue seems to serve as a global access point for the message queue which is consumed by the Event Dispatching Thread.

My questions are:

• Is the sole purpose of java.awt.EventQueue to serve as a global communication channel between other threads and the EDT? Any other scenarios to use it?

• How/When is the EDT launched?