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USA Edition | Today Is Monday, September 6, 2010 |
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| Browsing Science Section | 4 Items Found | ||
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Changing Forces Increasingly Expanding Our Universe
To know about Hubble, is to know about modern astronomy – for it is the world of Edwin Hubble and the HST that have filled the imaginations of everyone in astronomical science and defined the universe in ways astronomers could not have imagined only a quarter century ago.
Newsroom Magazine Contributor Harley Blank
Amateur Astronomer
Space — The Final Frontier
Hubble Forever Changed Mankind’s Understanding Of The Universe
In its first two decades of operation, the Hubble Space Telescope advanced astronomy by revealing the visible universe in more detail and spectral diversity than anyone might have dreamed when it was planned.
Had not there been a Hubble Space Telescope little would be known about either the size or nature of the universe beyond our own Milky Way. What scientists learned from Hubble revealed new insights into the composition of our universe — and the existence of two immensely important new discoveries, Dark Matter and Dark Force.
Only recently did NASA and specialists at the Space Telescope Science Institute ( STScI ) in Baltimore, commit to mapping the visible universe using NASA’s new Wise telescope. Yet had it not been for the Hubble telescope’s namesake, Edwin Hubble, astronomers would have little knowledge of where to look, or perhaps more to the point, what to look for.
In honor of the Hubble’s 20th anniversary, we chose some of the most interesting Hubble images. Each of the images in our collection includes a full HD version you may download to your browser and add to your collection of wallpaper and theme images.
To see the entire collection visit HubbleSite.
LCROSS Impact Illustration
Hubble Observes LCROSS Impact Event |
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 Artist's View Of Lunar CROSS Impact Event |
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| HD Resolution: 2,048 px × 2,048 px |
Filesize: 2,144.13 KB |
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NASA Says:
Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) and Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) were pointed just off the southern limb of the moon to look for a cloud of vaporized material blasted into space by the successive impacts of the rocket booster and spacecraft. The WFC3 images do not show any evidence for a temporary exosphere resulting from the impacts.
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Hickson Group
The Formative Years |
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 The Hickson Compact Group |
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| HD Resolution: 2,514 px × 1,940 px |
Filesize: 3,933.02 KB |
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NASA Says:
The composite image of Hickson Compact Group 31 shows four galaxies mixing it up. The bright, distorted object at middle, left, is actually two colliding dwarf galaxies. The bluish star clusters have formed in the streamers of debris pulled from the galaxies and at the site of their head-on collision. The cigar-shaped object above the galaxy duo is another member of the group. A bridge of star clusters connects the trio. A longer rope of bright star clusters points to the fourth member of the group, at lower right. The bright object in the center is a foreground star. The image was composed from observations made by the Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys, NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, and the Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX).
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Colorful Orion
Orion Nebula In Imax 3-D Rendering |
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 Orion Nebula In Imax 3-D |
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| HD Resolution: 1,268 px × 894 px |
Filesize: 515.84 KB |
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NASA Says:
The cinematic space odysseys are part of the new Imax film “Hubble 3D” a 43-minute movie that chronicles the 20-year life of Hubble and includes highlights from the May 2009 servicing mission to the Earth-orbiting observatory, with footage taken by the astronauts. The giant-screen film showcases some of Hubble’s breathtaking iconic pictures, such as the Eagle Nebula’s “Pillars of Creation,” as well as stunning views taken by the newly installed Wide Field Camera 3.
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Battle Of The Bulge
Galaxy NGC 4710 |
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 Galaxy NGC 4710 |
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| HD Resolution: 3,381 px × 1,305 px |
Filesize: 2,774.44 KB |
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NASA Says:
Just as many people are surprised to find themselves packing on unexplained weight around the middle, astronomers find the evolution of bulges in the centres of spiral galaxies puzzling. A recent NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image of NGC 4710 is part of a survey that astronomers have conducted to learn more about the formation of bulges, which are a substantial component of most spiral galaxies.