Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is a joint NASA and ESA observatory launched on April 24, 1990, aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery (STS‑31). Positioned in low Earth orbit at about 547 kilometers altitude, Hubble avoids atmospheric distortion and captures high-resolution observations in ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared light.
Named after American astronomer Edwin Hubble, the telescope was inspired by Lyman Spitzer’s 1946 proposal to place telescopes in space. Hubble features a 2.4-meter primary mirror and a suite of scientific instruments designed to be upgraded during space servicing missions.
Soon after deployment, a flaw was discovered in the shape of its primary mirror, which was corrected by astronauts during the first servicing mission in 1993. Over its lifetime, Hubble received five servicing missions, which not only fixed technical issues but also significantly upgraded its capabilities.
Hubble has transformed our understanding of the universe. It helped determine the age of the universe (~13.8 billion years), provided evidence for the acceleration of cosmic expansion due to dark energy, revealed the presence of supermassive black holes in galaxies, and observed planets outside our solar system.
Iconic images captured by Hubble—such as the Pillars of Creation and the Hubble Deep Field—have expanded public engagement with space and allowed astronomers to peer billions of years into the past, studying galaxy formation and cosmic evolution.
Now operating alongside the James Webb Space Telescope, Hubble continues to provide critical observations despite aging hardware, including issues with gyroscopes. Its contributions to astronomy remain unparalleled, offering a legacy of scientific discovery and technological achievement.
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APODs including "Hubble Space Telescope"
Mystic Mountain Monster being Destroyed
26 April 2026
Inside the head of this interstellar monster is a star that is slowly destroying it. The huge monster, actually an inanimate series of pillars of gas and dust, measures light years in length. The in-head star is not itself visible through the opaque interstellar dust but is bursting out partly by ejecting opposing beams of energetic particles called Herbig-Haro jets. Located about 7,500 light years away in the Carina Nebula and known informally as Mystic Mountain, the appearance of these pillars is dominated by dark dust even though they are composed mostly of clear hydrogen gas. The featured image was taken with the Hubble Space Telescope. All over these pillars, the energetic light and winds from massive newly formed stars are evaporating and dispersing the dusty stellar nurseries in which they formed. Within a few million years, the head of this giant, as well as most of its body, will have been completely evaporated by internal and surrounding stars.