Hubble

Pushing the Hubble Space Telescope's newest camera to its limits, astronomers say they have captured images of some of the most distant galaxies ever seen - more than 13 billion light years away. Amid a swarm of oddly shaped objects in the photograph are some dim, reddish spots that the scientists believe to be some of the earliest galaxies ever formed, seen as they appeared just 600 million years after the Big Bang that marked the beginning of the universe. "Preliminary indications are that we are indeed seeing some galaxies at [greater distances]

The Hubble Space Telescope's science team in Baltimore has lost one of its original leaders, a physicist whose comprehensive knowledge of the complex observatory helped keep its science operations running smoothly, and astronomers' discoveries rolling in. Rodger Doxsey, head of the Space Telescope Science Institute's Hubble Mission Office, died of cancer Tuesday after entering an area hospice over the weekend. The Towson resident was 62. "Rodger was the heart and soul of Hubble here at the Institute," said STScI's director, Matt Mountain.

One image appears uncannily like a butterfly, its ethereal wings extending into the blackness of space. But looks are deceiving, and the apparently tranquil scene actually depicts a violent nebula of superheated gas charging across the Milky Way Galaxy at 600,000 miles per hour, with a dying star once five times the mass of the sun at its center. In another picture, a cluster of several swirls of light seem to interact in a celestial dance, while a smaller, glowing circle hovers at some distance from the others.

With a flourish of new images - from exploding stars to colliding galaxies and a new impact scar on Jupiter - NASA officials finally pulled the wraps off the newly refurbished Hubble Space Telescope on Wednesday, almost four months after astronauts completed a final round of repairs and upgrades. "Hubble is back in action," said Heidi Hammel, senior research scientist at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.. "You're only getting the tiniest taste of what astronomers are planning to do with Hubble over the many years it's going to last."

The new science data computer that astronauts installed on the Hubble Space Telescope five weeks ago has malfunctioned. The science instruments that rely on the computer to transfer Hubble's discoveries to the ground have been shut down and placed in "safe" mode, NASA officials said Thursday. The space agency has named an anomaly review board to study the problem. The faulty computer, the Science Instrument Command and Data Handler, is not really new. It was a spare built before the Hubble was launched in 1990.

Hoping to tap into an economic engine that can weather the recession, Gov. Martin O'Malley unveiled a strategy Tuesday for bolstering the space industry's foothold in the state by lobbying for more federal dollars and emphasizing science and mathematics in schools. O'Malley, speaking to more than 500 aerospace industry representatives in Greenbelt, outlined a plan to harness what he characterized as the state's "unsung economic hero." The vision is similar to one the governor has articulated for the biotechnology industry as a way to further move the state from a manufacturing- to a knowledge-based economy.

Five days of work on the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope should end Tuesday morning with the release of what one astronomer said is "in many ways ... a brand new telescope." "At this point, Hubble actually has the largest complement of functioning instruments it has ever had" since its launch in 1990, said Mario Livio, senior scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. "This is going to be an observatory that is just so much more powerful and more promising." The crew of the shuttle Atlantis was to release the telescope just before 9 a.m. Tuesday.

The crowd of scientists watching on the big screen in the auditorium of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore went silent Thursday when it appeared a single stuck bolt might foil NASA's plans to install a powerful new camera on the Hubble Space Telescope. Astronaut Drew Feustel had tried and failed to budge it with his power wrench. If he couldn't muscle it into submission with elbow grease alone, the 15-year-old camera would have to be reconnected. Worse, its replacement - the $150 million Wide Field Camera 3, packing more than ten times the "discovery power" of the old camera - would have to be repacked for the ride home.

Astronomers around the world got their first close-up look at the Hubble Space Telescope in seven years Wednesday as astronauts aboard the shuttle Atlantis closed in and captured the orbiting observatory for its final round of repairs and upgrades. "When we first had images of the Hubble Space Telescope, there were audible gasps of elation. This was truly a wonderful sight after seven years," said Jon Morse, NASA's director of astrophysics. Mission specialist Megan McArthur grabbed the 12-ton telescope with the shuttle's robot arm at 1:14 p.m. while orbiting 350 miles above western Australia.