tagged w/ Hubble Telescope
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really amazing composite image of the Milky Way released by NASA. They combined infra red, visible, and x-ray images taken by Spitzer, Hubble, and Chandra to create one beautiful image to commemorate the 400 years since 1609, when Galileo looked up.
Source: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/milkyway_heart.htmlreally amazing composite image of the Milky Way released by NASA. They combined infra... more
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Check out these really beautiful images. Breathtaking!
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what happens when we can see past "the big bang"?
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Even though it's in the middle of a post-makeover checkout, the Hubble Space Telescope was turned toward Jupiter this week to capture a picture of the bruise left behind by a comet or asteroid - and it's a real beaut of a shiner.
Hubble's view, captured by its brand-new Wide Field Camera 3 on Thursday, is the sharpest visible-light image of the impact site, which was first seen by Australian amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley on Sunday and has been changing day by day. The picture also represents Hubble's first science observation since it was upgraded during May's final servicing mission by the space shuttle Atlantis' crew.
"This is just one example of what Hubble's new, state-of-the-art camera can do, thanks to the STS-125 astronauts and the entire Hubble team," Ed Weiler, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, said in an image advisory released today. "However, the best is yet to come!"
The team behind the observations was led by Space Science Institute astronomer Heidi Hammel. In the advisory, Hammel said the imagery "has revealed an astonishing wealth of data" about the impact site.Even though it's in the middle of a post-makeover checkout, the Hubble Space Telescope... more
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The Hubble Space Telescope was repaired and enhanced during the STS-125 mission of Space Shuttle Atlantis. Launched on May 11, 2009, the 11 day mission included some five spacewalks to make repairs and upgrades to the telescope, leaving it more capable and hopefully prepared to last another five years.
This educational video will explain astronomy for kids in a fun and engaging style with exciting computer animation and breath-taking images from the Hubble Telescope.The Hubble Space Telescope was repaired and enhanced during the STS-125 mission of... more
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The ten most important scientific discoveries that the Hubble made possible, and the amazing images to go with themThe ten most important scientific discoveries that the Hubble made possible, and the... more
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The Wide Field Camera 3 will let Hubble look deeper into space and further back in time than ever before. Dave Mosher gets the details on the telescope's newest eyes. Jorge Ribas produces.The Wide Field Camera 3 will let Hubble look deeper into space and further back in... more
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In an orbital first, astronauts opened up and installed new electronics on one of the Hubble Space Telescope's most important instruments on Saturday. But NASA must now wait for the results of a battery of tests to see if the ambitious repair job was a success.
The space shuttle Atlantis is currently orbiting Earth on an 11-day mission to refurbish Hubble and extend its life until at least 2014. This is the fifth and last mission to service the telescope, which NASA hopes will leave Hubble with its best vision yet.
After two days of spacewalks that ran over-schedule, astronauts John Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel made short work of the repair of Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), expected to be one of the most challenging tasks of the mission.In an orbital first, astronauts opened up and installed new electronics on one of the... more
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HOUSTON – Atlantis' astronauts suited up Sunday for their second in-orbit repair of a dead science instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope in as many days.
This time, Michael Massimino and Michael Good were going to venture out of space shuttle Atlantis to try to fix a long-dead spectrograph. The day before, two other spacewalkers fixed a camera.
As spacewalk preparations were under way Sunday morning, Mission Control notified the astronauts that testing had confirmed that two of the science channels on the repaired camera were working again. A third was not.
But the wide-field channel that was resuscitated is "the real workhorse" and carries 95 percent of the science output, Mission Control noted. "Fantastic! Power is restored," said astronaut John Grunsfeld, the chief Hubble handyman who made the camera repairs.
NASA officials hoped Sunday's spacewalk would be just as successful. Once outdoors, Massimino will have to remove 117 screws from the failed spectrograph, and he can't let any float away. It's a repair job that was not part of the scientific instrument's design, so NASA had to make dozens of special tools.
The light-separating device makes a fingerprint of cosmic objects. It is good for finding black holes and examining the atmosphere of planets outside our solar system.
This will be the fourth spacewalk for the Atlantis astronauts, leaving just one more before it's time to set the better-than-ever Hubble free. No further repair missions are planned for the 19-year-old observatory, which NASA expects to keep operating for another five to 10 years.HOUSTON – Atlantis' astronauts suited up Sunday for their second in-orbit repair of... more
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The Top 10 Weirdest Things in Space: Weird and strange things in theuniverse
Space is full of strange and often poorly understood things, from all-consuming black holes to exploding stars, from objects so dense a teaspoonful weighs a billion tons to empty "space" that may not be empty after all.
With 2001 promising to be a stellar year for space discovery, SPACE.com asked leading scientists to help us put together a list of the Top 10 Weirdest Things in Space.
Then we asked you to vote, and we've ordered the Top 10 based on the results.
Some of these objects and phenomena are pretty well understood. Others are complete mysteries. All of them remind us of the strange wonder of the cosmos.The Top 10 Weirdest Things in Space: Weird and strange things in theuniverse... more
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NASA
Toward the Infinite:
The heavens as revealed by the Hubble Space Telescope
In this show we present a collection of the best shots from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST).
Caption information (in order):
1) The Hubble Space Telescope superimposed on an image of NGC 2080, the 'Ghost Head Nebula', a star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud
2) Super-heavy stars in the Pismis 24 cluster heat gases of the surrounding nebula, NGC-6357
3) Rapid starbirth in the galaxy M82 creates a galactic stellar wind of glowing hydrogen (in white)
4) The Crab Nebula - a supernova remnant now more than 12 light years across
5) The Abell 901/902 supercluster with inferred dark matter shown as magenta-colored clumps
6) The Tarantula Nebula, a mix of very young and old stars orbiting the Milky Way 170,000 light years away
7) A tower of gas and dust 9.5 light years tall rising from the Eagle Nebula. Stars are forming inside the pillar
8) Star cluster NGC 346, an intense star-forming area of the Small Magellanic Cloud
9) Abel 2218 - a cluster of thousands of galaxies two billion light years awayHome Webshows Products Music Screensavers Support Contact us
NASA... more
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US astronauts took off Monday at the start of a high-risk mission to service, for the last time, the Hubble telescope, which has revolutionized humankind's understanding of the universe.US astronauts took off Monday at the start of a high-risk mission to service, for the... more
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KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — Seven astronauts blasted off for one last dance with the Hubble Space Telescope on Monday.
The space shuttle Atlantis, commanded by Scott D. Altman, bolted through the sky on a pillar of smoke and fire just after 2 p.m. Monday. Atlantis is carrying 22,000 pounds of custom-designed tools, replacement parts and new instruments to slice and dice starlight as well as the hearts of scientists and stargazers everywhere. It is rushing toward a Wednesday rendezvous with the telescope, which happened to be floating about 350 miles directly above Cape Canaveral at launching time.
If all goes well, in five spacewalks starting Thursday morning, the crew members will revamp and refresh the telescope, which has dazzled the public and the science community with its iconic cosmic postcards. Then they will say goodbye on behalf of humanity forever. Sometime in the middle of the next decade, the Hubble will run out of juice, and it will eventually be crashed into the ocean.
Besides Commander Altman, the crew includes Gregory C. Johnson, as pilot, and John M. Grunsfeld, Michael J. Massimino, Michael T. Good, Andrew J. Fuestel and K. Megan McArthur, as mission specialists.
The Atlantis astronauts will spend Tuesday examining the shuttle with cameras looking for any dings or nicks or holes caused by flying debris during the launching. The shuttle Columbia was doomed in 2003 because a hunk of insulating foam broke off the external fuel tank and damaged the tiles that protected the spacecraft from the searing heat of re-entering the atmosphere.
The astronauts carry a tool kit for fixing small holes or cracks in the fragile tiles. If there is something they cannot fix, they will hunker down and await the shuttle Endeavour, which is sitting on another launching pad, ready to blast off with a four-man crew and retrieve the Atlantis astronauts from danger.
“The sad thing is if we get to orbit and see something bad and get waved off and don’t get to fix Hubble,” Dr. Grunsfeld said. “That would be the saddest.”
End of Excerpt
Source: The New York Times OnlineKENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — Seven astronauts blasted off for one last dance with... more
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Seven astronauts blasted off on the space shuttle Atlantis on Monday for one last flight to the Hubble Space Telescope — an extraordinarily ambitious mission that NASA hopes will lift the celebrated observatory to new scientific heights.
The six men and one woman who will attempt the complicated, riskier-than-usual job shouted, waved and raised their fists as they headed out to the pad, eager to get going after waiting seven months to fly. Their flight was delayed last fall, two weeks before the scheduled launch, after the orbiting telescope broke down.
The 19-year-old Hubble, last visited by astronauts seven years ago, is way overdue for a tuneup.
In this fifth and final repair mission, two spacewalking teams will replace Hubble's batteries and gyroscopes, install two new cameras and take a crack at fixing two broken science instruments, something never before attempted. Those instruments, loaded with bolts and fasteners, were not designed to be tinkered with in space.
Endeavour, the rescue ship, is ready to lift off within a week if necessary to save Atlantis' crew.Seven astronauts blasted off on the space shuttle Atlantis on Monday for one last... more
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The right tools can make any job easier, and that will be especially true this week when the Hubble Space Telescope gets its last tuneup.
When space shuttle Atlantis blasts off Monday on the final flight to Hubble, the astronauts will be carrying 180 special tools, and 116 of them were designed just for this mission, which involves tricky repairs to two science instruments that were never intended to be fixed in space. Liftoff is scheduled for 2:01 p.m. EDT.
The Hubble Space Telescope was launched in 1990. It has been serviced four times before, with the last servicing mission occurring in 2002.
"Over the last few years, we've seen significant deterioration within the set of scientific instruments that we provide to the astronomical community," says David Leckrone, senior project scientist for Hubble at NASA.
He says that after this visit, if all goes well, Hubble should be more powerful than ever before.
Astronauts are scheduled to go on five spacewalks to give the telescope an upgrade that includes new batteries and gyroscopes, and additional science instruments.
But some of the most ambitious repair work involves "actually going into the very guts of instruments that have suffered failures that were never meant to be touched on orbit," says Michael Weiss, deputy program manager for Hubble at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.The right tools can make any job easier, and that will be especially true this week... more
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Nasa is set to dispatch seven astronauts on its most dangerous ever shuttle mission as it attempts to rescue the $7 billion Hubble Space Telescope from meltdown.
Led by former US Navy fighter pilot Scott Altman, 49, a one-time stunt flier for actor Tom Cruise in the film Top Gun, the crew of Atlantis will repair and upgrade the orbiting observatory, risking a potentially deadly space-junk collision that could leave them stranded 350 miles above Earth.
The mission, which is costing Nasa $1.4 billion and is due to blast off from Florida tomorrow, is considered so perilous that it was once canceled by space agency chiefs who feared that it could cost the astronauts their lives.
It was resurrected only after they agreed to place a second shuttle and crew on emergency standby, ready to blast into space to save their colleagues should a catastrophe occur. The move is unprecedented in the 28-year history of the shuttle fleet.
Should a rescue become necessary, it would provide the greatest space drama since the abortive Apollo 13 lunar mission in 1970, say Nasa insiders, when three astronauts limped their crippled spacecraft home just hours from death, following an on-board explosion.
Among the greatest hazards facing Atlantis is the intense amount of space junk - such as broken satellites and dead rockets - that is cluttering the area where the shuttle will rendezvous with Hubble.
Shuttle flights usually only go to the International Space Station no more than 250 miles up - but at 350 miles, where Hubble flies, the hazards are far greater.
If Atlantis suffers damage, the crew would be marooned.Nasa is set to dispatch seven astronauts on its most dangerous ever shuttle mission as... more
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" Science Channel will broadcast LIVE coverage of the fourth and final space shuttle mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope with HUBBLE LIVE: THE FINAL MISSION airing Monday, May 11, 2009, at 1:30 PM (ET) / 10:30 AM (PT). The network will also encore the live broadcast in primetime at 9 PM (ET) following the premiere of the all-new special THE ENDS OF THE EARTH: HUBBLE'S FINAL CHAPTER at 8 PM (ET). *Live coverage contingent upon NASA's launch of the Shuttle Atlantis. Launch date and/or time subject to change.
Originating from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., Science Channel's live coverage of the launch of the Space Shuttle Atlantis, HUBBLE LIVE: THE FINAL MISSION, will feature in-depth, exclusive analysis from NASA astrophysicist and space telescope expert Dr. Kim Weaver and former NASA astronaut Paul William Richards. The one-hour special will also feature live NASA coverage from the launch site at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and the Mission Control Center at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.
Since 1990 the Hubble Space Telescope has served as humanity's eye on the universe. The telescope has sent thousands of images back to Earth that have altered scientists' views of the cosmos and helped to answer important questions. THE ENDS OF THE EARTH: HUBBLE'S FINAL CHAPTER, premiering Monday, May 11 at 8 PM (ET) explores the telescope's rich history with interviews from NASA astronauts Mike Massimino and John Grunsfeld, members of the seven person crew assigned to repair Hubble, and with never-before-seen high-definition footage of the underwater training the crew undertook for more than one year."" Science Channel will broadcast LIVE coverage of the fourth and final space shuttle... more
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It's a deep space mission, more ambitious in scope than anything essayed for almost 40 years. The measure of the risk is that when the Nasa space shuttle takes off next month for its last hurrah a second capsule will sit on the launchpad in case an unprecedented rescue mission is needed.
When seven astronauts board the Atlantis shuttle on 11 May for an 11-day mission to repair the ailing Hubble telescope, they will be aware of the formidable task ahead. Five spacewalks to replace broken parts. No space station nearby as a refuge. Earth more than 350 miles below. But the significance of the Hubble repair mission goes much further than the technical challenges facing the crew. This mission amounts to the swansong of the shuttle, the culmination of a 30-year, $170bn (£115bn) programme to consolidate humankind's mastery over space.It's a deep space mission, more ambitious in scope than anything essayed for almost 40... more
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A spectacular new image of an unusual spiral galaxy in the Coma Galaxy Cluster has been created from data taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys on the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. It reveals lots of new details of the galaxy, NGC 4921, as well as an extraordinary rich background of more remote galaxies stretching back to the early Universe.A spectacular new image of an unusual spiral galaxy in the Coma Galaxy Cluster has... more
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