The Hubble Space Telescope

The major drawback of ground based telescopes is that one must observe the sky through the earth's atmosphere. The effects on the quality of the images produced are significant. If only one could get a telescope above the atmosphere.

In 1990 NASA deployed the Hubble Space Telescope. It was carried up in the cargo bay of a space shuttle and put into orbit. Although the quality of the images first obtained were very good it was realised that there was a tiny fault in the primary mirror which had to be fixed. In 1993 a space shuttle mission was launched to correct the optics problem. It was fantastically successful and from then onwards the HST has produced the most detailed images of the cosmos ever obtained.

Several other missions have serviced the telescope and improved the onboard instruments though at this time, due to the risks of using the shuttle, no other missions are planned.

A spectacular view of Saturn.	Evidence for black holes. The spectrograph on board Hubble at work.
The pillars of creation. Star birth inside a nebula.	An image showing a multitude of distant galaxies. Hubble has looked further than anything before.

all pics NASA

NASA have a fantastic program for education and the public sharing of the knowledge they gain from using the HST. The official site is well worth a visit.

http:/hubble.nasa.gov