Hubble Space TelescopeLaunched into low Earth orbit in 1990
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990, and remains in operation. With a 2.4-meter (7.9 ft) mirror, Hubble's four main instruments observe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared spectra. The telescope is named after the astronomer Edwin Hubble.
Hubble's orbit outside the distortion of Earth's atmosphere allows it to take extremely high-resolution images with almost no background light. Hubble has recorded some of the most detailed visible-light images ever, allowing a deep view into space and time. Many Hubble observations have led to breakthroughs in astrophysics, such as accurately determining the rate of expansion of the universe.
Hubble's orbit outside the distortion of Earth's atmosphere allows it to take extremely high-resolution images with almost no background light. Hubble has recorded some of the most detailed visible-light images ever, allowing a deep view into space and time. Many Hubble observations have led to breakthroughs in astrophysics, such as accurately determining the rate of expansion of the universe.
Conception, design and aimsGround support
The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is responsible for the scientific operation of the telescope and the delivery of data products to astronomers. STScI is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and is physically located in Baltimore, Maryland on the Homewood campus of Johns Hopkins University, one of the 39 US universities and seven international affiliates that make up the AURA consortium. STScI was established in 1981 after something of a power struggle between NASA and the scientific community at large. NASA had wanted to keep this function in-house, but scientists wanted it to be based in an academic establishment. The Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF), established at Garching bei München near Munich in 1984, provides similar support for European astronomers.
Servicing Mission 4 Flown by Atlantis in May 2009
Servicing Mission 4 Flown by Atlantis in May 2009
SM4 installed the WFC3
Hubble during SM4
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Plans called for Hubble to be serviced in February 2005, but the Columbia disaster in 2003, in which the orbiter disintegrated on re-entry into the atmosphere, had wide-ranging effects on the Hubble program. NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe decided that all future shuttle missions had to be able to reach the safe haven of the International Space Station should in-flight problems develop. As no shuttles were capable of reaching both HST and the ISS during the same mission, future manned service missions were canceled. This decision was assailed by numerous astronomers, who felt that Hubble was valuable enough to merit the human risk.[80] HST's planned successor, the James Webb Telescope (JWST), is not expected to launch until at least 2018. A gap in space-observing capabilities between a decommissioning of Hubble and the commissioning of a successor is of major concern to many astronomers, given the significant scientific impact of HST. The consideration that JWST will not be located in low Earth orbit, and therefore cannot be easily upgraded or repaired in the event of an early failure, only makes these concerns more acute. On the other hand, many astronomers felt strongly that the servicing of Hubble should not take place if the expense were to come from the JWST budget.
SM4 installed the WFC3, which captured this image of the Butterfly Nebula.
In January 2004, O'Keefe said he would review his decision to cancel the final servicing mission to HST due to public outcry and requests from Congress for NASA to look for a way to save it. The National Academy of Sciences convened an official panel, which recommended in July 2004 that the HST should be preserved despite the apparent risks. Their report urged "NASA should take no actions that would preclude a space shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope". In August 2004, O'Keefe asked Goddard Space Flight Center to prepare a detailed proposal for a robotic service mission. These plans were later canceled, the robotic mission being described as "not feasible". In late 2004, several Congressional members, led by Senator Barbara Mikulski, held public hearings and carried on a fight with much public support (including thousands of letters from school children across the country) to get the Bush Administration and NASA to reconsider the decision to drop plans for a Hubble rescue mission.
The nomination in April 2005 of a new NASA Administrator with an engineering rather than accounting background, Michael D. Griffin, changed the situation, as Griffin stated he would consider a manned servicing mission.[85] Soon after his appointment Griffin authorized Goddard to proceed with preparations for a manned Hubble maintenance flight, saying he would make the final decision after the next two shuttle missions. In October 2006 Griffin gave the final go-ahead, and the 11-day mission by Atlantis was scheduled for October 2008. Hubble's main data-handling unit failed in September 2008, halting all reporting of scientific data until its back-up was brought online on October 25, 2008. Since a failure of the backup unit would leave the HST helpless, the service mission was postponed to incorporate a replacement for the primary unit.
Servicing Mission 4, flown by Atlantis in May 2009, was the last scheduled shuttle mission for HST.[71][88] SM4 installed the replacement data-handling unit, repaired the ACS and STIS systems, installed improved nickel hydrogen batteries, and replaced other components. SM4 also installed two new observation instruments—Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS)[89]—and the Soft Capture and Rendezvous System, which will enable the future rendezvous, capture, and safe disposal of Hubble by either a crewed or robotic mission. The work accomplished during SM4 is expected to render the telescope fully functioning at least into 2014, and perhaps longer.
SM4 installed the WFC3, which captured this image of the Butterfly Nebula.
In January 2004, O'Keefe said he would review his decision to cancel the final servicing mission to HST due to public outcry and requests from Congress for NASA to look for a way to save it. The National Academy of Sciences convened an official panel, which recommended in July 2004 that the HST should be preserved despite the apparent risks. Their report urged "NASA should take no actions that would preclude a space shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope". In August 2004, O'Keefe asked Goddard Space Flight Center to prepare a detailed proposal for a robotic service mission. These plans were later canceled, the robotic mission being described as "not feasible". In late 2004, several Congressional members, led by Senator Barbara Mikulski, held public hearings and carried on a fight with much public support (including thousands of letters from school children across the country) to get the Bush Administration and NASA to reconsider the decision to drop plans for a Hubble rescue mission.
The nomination in April 2005 of a new NASA Administrator with an engineering rather than accounting background, Michael D. Griffin, changed the situation, as Griffin stated he would consider a manned servicing mission.[85] Soon after his appointment Griffin authorized Goddard to proceed with preparations for a manned Hubble maintenance flight, saying he would make the final decision after the next two shuttle missions. In October 2006 Griffin gave the final go-ahead, and the 11-day mission by Atlantis was scheduled for October 2008. Hubble's main data-handling unit failed in September 2008, halting all reporting of scientific data until its back-up was brought online on October 25, 2008. Since a failure of the backup unit would leave the HST helpless, the service mission was postponed to incorporate a replacement for the primary unit.
Servicing Mission 4, flown by Atlantis in May 2009, was the last scheduled shuttle mission for HST.[71][88] SM4 installed the replacement data-handling unit, repaired the ACS and STIS systems, installed improved nickel hydrogen batteries, and replaced other components. SM4 also installed two new observation instruments—Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS)[89]—and the Soft Capture and Rendezvous System, which will enable the future rendezvous, capture, and safe disposal of Hubble by either a crewed or robotic mission. The work accomplished during SM4 is expected to render the telescope fully functioning at least into 2014, and perhaps longer.
Hubble during SM4
Ultra Deep FieldDiscovering the dark
The Hubble Ultra Deep Field in 3D
Range of ultraviolet light Range of ultraviolet light
Range of ultraviolet light Range of ultraviolet light
Hubble Ultra-Deep Field
400 orbits of Director's Discretionary time to the UDF
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In the years since the original Hubble Deep Field, the Hubble Deep Field South and the GOODS sample were analyzed, providing increased statistics at the high redshifts probed by the HDF. When the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) detector was installed on the HST, it was realized that an ultra-deep field could observe galaxy formation out to even higher redshifts than had currently been observed, as well as providing more information about galaxy formation at intermediate redshifts (z~2). A workshop on how to best carry out surveys with the ACS was held at STScI in late 2002. At the workshop Massimo Stiavelli advocated an Ultra Deep Field as a way to study the objects responsible for the reionization of the Universe. Following the workshop, the STScI Director Steven Beckwith decided to devote 400 orbits of Director's Discretionary time to the UDF and appointed Stiavelli as the lead of the Home Team implementing the observations.
Unlike the Deep Fields, the HUDF does not lie in Hubble's Continuous Viewing Zone (CVZ). The earlier observations, using the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) camera, were able to take advantage of the increased observing time on these zones by using wavelengths with higher noise to observe at times when earthshine contaminated the observations; however ACS does not observe at these wavelengths, so the advantage was reduced.
As with the earlier fields, this one was required to contain very little emission from our galaxy, with little Zodiacal dust. The field was also required to be in a range of declinations such that it could be observed both by southern hemisphere instruments, such as the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, and northern hemisphere ones, such as those located on Hawaii. It was ultimately decided to observe a section of the Chandra Deep Field South, due to existing deep X-ray observations from Chandra X-ray Observatory and two interesting objects already observed in the GOODS sample at the same location: a redshift 5.8 galaxy and a supernova. The coordinates of the field are right ascension 3h 32m 39.0s, declination −27° 47′ 29.1″ (J2000). The field is 200 arcseconds to a side, with a total area of 11 square arcminutes, and lies in the constellation of Fornax.
HUDF with NICMOS infrared data. Slightly different framing
WFC3 infrared data from part of the field (with labels)
Four filters were used on the ACS, centered on 435, 606, 775 and 850 nm, with exposure times set to give equal sensitivity in all filters. These wavelength ranges match those used by the GOODS sample, allowing direct comparison between the two. As with the Deep Fields, the HUDF used Directors Discretionary Time. In order to get the best resolution possible, the observations were dithered by pointing the telescope at slightly different positions for each exposure—a process trialled with the Hubble Deep Field—so that the final image has a higher resolution than the pixels on their own would normally allow.
The observations were done in two sessions, from September 23 to October 28, 2003, and December 4, 2003, to January 15, 2004. The total exposure time is just under 1 million seconds, from 400 orbits, with a typical exposure time of 1200 seconds.[7] In total, 800 ACS exposures were taken over the course of 11.3 days, 2 every orbit, and NICMOS observed for 4.5 days. All the individual ACS exposures were processed and combined by Anton Koekemoer into a single set of scientifically useful images, each with a total exposure time ranging from 134,900 seconds to 347,100 seconds. To observe the whole sky to the same sensitivity, the HST would need to observe continuously for a million years.
Unlike the Deep Fields, the HUDF does not lie in Hubble's Continuous Viewing Zone (CVZ). The earlier observations, using the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) camera, were able to take advantage of the increased observing time on these zones by using wavelengths with higher noise to observe at times when earthshine contaminated the observations; however ACS does not observe at these wavelengths, so the advantage was reduced.
As with the earlier fields, this one was required to contain very little emission from our galaxy, with little Zodiacal dust. The field was also required to be in a range of declinations such that it could be observed both by southern hemisphere instruments, such as the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, and northern hemisphere ones, such as those located on Hawaii. It was ultimately decided to observe a section of the Chandra Deep Field South, due to existing deep X-ray observations from Chandra X-ray Observatory and two interesting objects already observed in the GOODS sample at the same location: a redshift 5.8 galaxy and a supernova. The coordinates of the field are right ascension 3h 32m 39.0s, declination −27° 47′ 29.1″ (J2000). The field is 200 arcseconds to a side, with a total area of 11 square arcminutes, and lies in the constellation of Fornax.
HUDF with NICMOS infrared data. Slightly different framing
WFC3 infrared data from part of the field (with labels)
Four filters were used on the ACS, centered on 435, 606, 775 and 850 nm, with exposure times set to give equal sensitivity in all filters. These wavelength ranges match those used by the GOODS sample, allowing direct comparison between the two. As with the Deep Fields, the HUDF used Directors Discretionary Time. In order to get the best resolution possible, the observations were dithered by pointing the telescope at slightly different positions for each exposure—a process trialled with the Hubble Deep Field—so that the final image has a higher resolution than the pixels on their own would normally allow.
The observations were done in two sessions, from September 23 to October 28, 2003, and December 4, 2003, to January 15, 2004. The total exposure time is just under 1 million seconds, from 400 orbits, with a typical exposure time of 1200 seconds.[7] In total, 800 ACS exposures were taken over the course of 11.3 days, 2 every orbit, and NICMOS observed for 4.5 days. All the individual ACS exposures were processed and combined by Anton Koekemoer into a single set of scientifically useful images, each with a total exposure time ranging from 134,900 seconds to 347,100 seconds. To observe the whole sky to the same sensitivity, the HST would need to observe continuously for a million years.
400 orbits of Director's Discretionary time to the UDF
Hubble at IMAXAward winning
Trailer for the award winning IMAX film about the Hubble Space Telescope.
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Hubble Space Telescope
Conception, design and aims
Servicing Mission 4
Range of ultraviolet light
Hubble at IMAX
Hubble Space Telescope
Conception, design and aims
Servicing Mission 4
Range of ultraviolet light
Hubble at IMAX