|
|
| New Hubble Servicing Mission to upgrade instruments [heic0618] |
| After more than a decade of fascinating discoveries, The Hubble Space Telescope will soon be given the new beginning that it deserves. On Tuesday, 31 October 2006, NASA has decided to approve a Space Shuttle mission to repair and upgrade the observatory, despite new Shuttle safety rules formulated after the Columbia disaster that would normally rule out such a rescue mission. |
| Date: 02 Nov 2006 |
|
|
| Latest views of the V838 Monocerotis light echo from Hubble [heic 0617] |
| Hubble has returned to the intriguing V838 Monocerotis many times since its initial outburst in 2002 to follow the evolution of its light echo. Two new images provide the most astonishing views of V838 to date.
|
| Date: 26 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble yields direct proof of stellar sorting in a globular cluster [heic0616] |
| A seven year study with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has provided astronomers with the best observational evidence yet that globular clusters sort out stars according to their mass, governed by the gravitational interactions between the stars. Heavier stars slow down and sink to the cluster's core, while lighter stars pick up speed and move across the cluster to its periphery. This process, called mass segregation, has long been suspected for globular star clusters, but has never before been directly seen in action. |
| Date: 25 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| The Colliding Antennae Galaxies [heic0615] |
| A new Hubble image of the Antennae galaxies is the sharpest yet of this merging pair of galaxies. As the two galaxies smash together, billions of stars are born, mostly in groups and clusters of stars. The brightest and most compact of these are called super star clusters. |
| Date: 17 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Flies in a spider's web: Galaxy caught in the making [heic0614] |
| New Hubble images have provided a dramatic glimpse of a large massive galaxy under assembly as smaller galaxies merge. This has commonly been thought to be the way galaxies grew in the young Universe, but now Hubble observations of the radio galaxy MRC 1138-262, nicknamed the "Spiderweb Galaxy", have shown dozens of star-forming satellite galaxies in the actual process of merging. |
| Date: 12 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble observations confirm that planets form from disks around stars [heic0613] |
| The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, in collaboration with ground-based observatories, has at last confirmed what philosopher Emmanuel Kant and scientists have long predicted: that planets form from debris disks around stars. |
| Date: 10 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble finds 16 candidate extrasolar planets far across our Galaxy [heic0612] |
| The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has discovered 16 extrasolar planet candidates that are orbiting a variety of distant stars. In accomplishing this, Hubble looked farther into our Milky Way galaxy than has ever successfully been done before in searching for extrasolar planets. The Hubble observations reach all the way into the central bulge of our galaxy, 26 000 light-years away, or one-quarter the diameter of the Milky Way's spiral disk. |
| Date: 04 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Update on ACS Operations |
| Hubble's workhorse, the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), resumed science operations on 1 October 2006 with one of its three channels, the Wide Field Channel (WFC), brought back into service. Historically, this channel has accounted for 70-80% of all observations obtained with the ACS. Observations with the WFC form an integral part of the HST science observing plan for next week. |
| Date: 02 Oct 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble finds hundreds of young galaxies in the early Universe [heic0611] |
| Astronomers analyzing two of the deepest views of the cosmos made with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have uncovered a gold mine of galaxies, more than 500 that existed less than a billion years after the Big Bang. These galaxies thrived when the cosmos was less than 7 percent of its present age of 13.7 billion years. This sample represents the most comprehensive compilation of galaxies in the early Universe, researchers said. |
| Date: 22 Sep 2006 |
|
|
| Planet or failed star? Hubble photographs one of the smallest stellar companions ever seen [heic0610] |
| Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have photographed one of the smallest objects ever seen around a normal star beyond our Sun. Weighing in at 12 times the mass of Jupiter, the object is small enough to be a planet. The conundrum is that it's also large enough to be a brown dwarf, a failed star. |
| Date: 07 Sep 2006 |
|
|
| Cassiopeia A - The colourful aftermath of a violent stellar death [heic0609] |
| A new image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope provides a detailed look at the tattered remains of a supernova explosion known as Cassiopeia A (Cas A). It is the youngest known remnant from a supernova explosion in the Milky Way. The new Hubble image shows the complex and intricate structure of the star's shattered fragments. |
| Date: 30 Aug 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble Sees Faintest Stars in a Globular Cluster [heic0608] |
| The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has uncovered what astronomers are reporting as the dimmest stars ever seen in any globular star cluster. Globular clusters are spherical concentrations of hundreds-of-thousands of stars. |
| Date: 17 Aug 2006 |
|
|
| Large and small stars in harmonious coexistence [heic0607] |
| The latest photo from the Hubble Space Telescope, presented at the 2006 General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union in Prague this week, shows a star forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). This sharp image reveals a large number of low-mass infant stars coexisting with young massive stars. |
| Date: 15 Aug 2006 |
|
|
| ACS Back Online |
| The Advanced Camera for Surveys aboard the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope was successfully reactivated on Friday 30 June 2006. |
| Date: 03 Jul 2006 |
|
|
| Naming of Pluto's two small Moons |
| The two small Pluto moons with temporary designations S/2005 P 1 and S/2005 P 2, discovered in mid-May 2005 with the Hubble Space Telescope by Weaver et. al., have now been named by the International Astromical Union. |
| Date: 28 Jun 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble ACS in Safe Mode |
| NASA engineers continue to examine the issues surrounding a problem related to the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. |
| Date: 28 Jun 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble captures a five-star rated gravitational lens [heic0606] |
| The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the first-ever picture of a distant quasar lensed into five images. In addition the picture holds a treasure of lensed galaxies and even a supernova. |
| Date: 23 May 2006 |
|
|
| Hubble provides spectacular view of ongoing comet breakup [heic0605] |
| The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is providing astronomers with extraordinary views of comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 as it disintegrates before our eyes. Recent Hubble images have uncovered many more fragments than have been reported by ground-based observers. These observations provide an unprecedented opportunity to study the demise of a comet nucleus. |
| Date: 27 Apr 2006 |
|
|
| 16th Anniversary of Hubble Space Telescope [heic0604] |
| To celebrate the NASA-ESA Hubble Space Telescope's 16 years of success, the two space agencies are releasing this mosaic image of the magnificent starburst galaxy, Messier 82 (M82). It is the sharpest wide-angle view ever obtained of M82, a galaxy remarkable for its webs of shredded clouds and flame-like plumes of glowing hydrogen blasting out from its central regions. |
| Date: 24 Apr 2006 |
|
|
| Magellanic gemstones in the southern sky [heic0603] |
| Hubble has captured the most detailed images to date of the open star clusters NGC 265 and NGC 290 in the Small Magellanic Cloud - two sparkling sets of gemstones in the southern sky. |
| Date: 19 Apr 2006 |
|
|
