Specs
Launch date: April 24, 1990
Launch vehicle: space shuttle Discovery
Time to orbit Earth: about 95 minutes
Orbital speed: 27,200 km/h (16,900 mph)
Altitude: 600 km (370 miles)
Most recent servicing mission: March 2002

A distant nebula where stars were born, photographed by the Hubble. Photo courtesy of NASA.

When the Hubble was launched, it had a slight defect in one of its mirrors, which meant that the first images sent back from the telescope were more blurry than expected. But since the Hubble was designed to be upgraded and serviced by astronauts, the first servicing mission, which took place in 1993, added some corrective lenses as well as a more powerful camera. Then the Hubble could send back views of the stars that were better than any ever seen from Earth—primarily because it was outside the Earth's atmosphere, which distorts our view of space. (The atmosphere is what makes stars twinkle.)

Some of the galaxies seen in the Hubble Deep Field. Photo courtesy of NASA and STScI.

One of the most amazing areas of research undertaken by Hubble scientists has been the Hubble Deep Field (HDF) project. Because the HDF project examines objects billions of light years away, the light the Hubble captures is from events that happened billions of years ago. So when the Hubble captures images from far away into the deep universe, it's also like looking back in time. Studies of the HDF images have uncovered many surprising new discoveries, such as the occurrence of a "stellar baby boom" shortly after the Big Bang which peaked around three billion years later. Most of the stars that exist today were born during this stellar population explosion. The HDF research has also supported the theory that the universe looks the same in all directions.

In addition to the things we have learned from the Hubble about the nature of deep space and the history and development of the universe, we have also found out more about our own cosmic neighborhood. The Hubble data revealed the existence of oxygen on Europa. Plus, the Hubble relayed photos of a volcanic eruption from Io, spotted storms on Neptune, Jupiter and Mars, captured images of Saturn and Jupiter's auroras and even gave a weather report for the Pathfinder landing on Mars. Outside our galaxy, the Hubble data confirmed the existence of black holes and sent back data on the phenomena of star death, quasars and more. Images from the Hubble have also revealed that flat disks of dust and gases, thought to be possible precursors to planet formation, encircle many developing stars.

Astronauts servicing the shuttle in the bay of shuttle Columbia during the most recent servicing mission. Photo courtesy of NASA.

During the latest servicing mission, which happened in March 2002, the Hubble was upgraded with a new set of three cameras, new solar wings and a cooling unit to support an infrared camera that's already on board. The new cameras will give Hubble ten times more power to see far-off objects, which will make it possible for Hubble scientists to look for planets outside our solar system.

The Hubble Space Telescope on display in the gallery is a 1/5 scale model. It was donated to us by Lockheed Corporation.

Hubble Space Telescope Links
HubbleSite
The Space Telescope Science Institute put together this easy-to-surf website, which offers glimpses into the science of the Hubble, news on recent discoveries and of course, some spectacular images. The site even features a build-your-own-comet game.

The Hubble Project
NASA's huge Hubble site features the latest news, images and even behind-the-scenes webcams of Hubble-related NASA projects. The site also includes a Hubble timeline of all past and future servicing missions and a helpful glossary, which offers explanations for a host of Hubble acronyms.

The Best of the Hubble Space Telescope
This site from the Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS) is all about images! The main page includes links to some of the best Hubble images, listed by subject.

Hubble Deep Field
This subsite of the HubbleSite will take you deep into the universe using images from the Hubble along with music and sound. To get the maximum effect from the page, be sure to turn on your speakers.