The largest space telescope on the planet

The Atlantis spacecraft is undergoing the last repair and maintenance of the Hubble Space Telescope. Over 5 years, it will fulfill its mission and rest in the ocean.

The Hubble Space Telescope ($ 1.5 billion) was put on orbit by Discovery spacecraft about 610 km from Earth on April 24, 1990. It is named after Edward Hubble, an American astronomer who has greatly expanded human knowledge of galaxies. He is also one of the first to prove that the universe is constantly stretching and bulging.

Hubble's telescope light mirror has a diameter of 2.4 meters. A crack is detected in the mirror after the glass is launched into space. Although the thickness of the crack is only 1/5 of the paper, it still deforms the image of the glass. Astronauts repaired in 1993.

At the size of a large bus, the Hubble telescope moves at 8 km / sec. It passed through the United States for 10 minutes and made a circle around the earth for 1.5 hours.

This is one of the most detailed photos of the universe that Hubble has captured. It is made up of 342 different images. Dear Hubble, taking those 342 photos over 10 days. In the complete picture there are more than 1,500 galaxies. It helps scientists more accurately predict the age of the universe and better understand dark energy.

The photo, "Giant Whales," is one of Hubble's most captivating images. There are huge columns of gas in the image of the Serpen constellation, about 6,500 light-years from Earth.

Without being affected by the atmosphere, Hubble can capture clearer images than ground-based telescopes. Each week it sends back to Earth 12 GB of image data. Its findings have created more than 6,000 scientific articles.

The astronauts on the Atlantis spacecraft will install a wide-angle camera capable of capturing the entire planet on the Hubble telescope.

American astronauts are repairing Hubble. As planned, the telescope will "retire" in 2014. After leaving the universe, Hubble will fall into the ocean. The replacement telescope called James Webb is capable of taking infrared images. This will help scientists study more remote areas in the universe.