The Hubble Space Telescope hits the one billion second mark

The Hubble telescope with the mission to explore the vast universe has been operating for 31.7 years, bringing a lot of valuable scientific information.

The Hubble Space Telescope operates above Earth's atmosphere.

The Hubble Space Telescope was launched into space on April 24, 1990 by the space shuttle Discovery. The next day, it began orbiting, carrying out a mission to explore the vast universe including distant galaxies, supernovas, nebulae and exoplanets. On January 1, 2022, this famous telescope officially reached the milestone of one billion seconds in space, equivalent to 31.7 years.

"For more than three decades, Hubble has provided us with groundbreaking scientific findings and many iconic images of the universe," NASA announced.

The Hubble telescope is a joint mission between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA). From 1993 to 2009, the astronauts "visited" Hubble five times by spacecraft launched under the space shuttle program. These visits are intended to repair, upgrade, and replace telescope systems such as batteries, gyroscopes, and a number of other scientific instruments.

Operating very high above Earth's atmosphere, Hubble has made more than 1.5 million observations over its 30+ years of operation. Thousands of scientific studies have been published based on the telescope's findings, according to NASA.

Some of Hubble's most notable achievements are helping to determine the age of the universe (about 13.8 billion years, three times the age of Earth) and the rate at which the universe is expanding, discovering Pluto's 5th moon , found supermassive black holes at the centers of the most massive galaxies, studied the effects of gravitational lensing - thereby helping astronomers map the distribution of dark matter in the universe, recording some of the most spectacular deep-field images (observing a certain area of ​​the sky for long periods of time) of the universe.

"We can only imagine the discoveries the next billion seconds will bring as new telescopes such as James Webb (launched December 25, 2021) and Nancy Grace Roman (unlaunched) continue to evolve. build on the findings of Hubble and work with Hubble to expand our knowledge of the universe," NASA wrote in the announcement.