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Hubble has orbited Earth for three decades. When one of its computers failed, NASA had to call in former engineers still familiar with its technology. The Hubble space telescope has been orbiting Earth at a distance of kilometers for the past 31 years, capturing stunning imagery of faraway stars and galaxies.
Although the mission was supposed to end after 15 years, Hubble has remained in operation to this day. It has sent some 1. On June 13, , however, an onboard computer failed which controls the unit's science instruments. This caused all non-essential systems to be shut down. They are using the restored Hubble, which orbits Earth at miles in altitude, to collect images of unusual galaxies. Of course, the new images would not have been possible if older scientists had not been available to help service the telescope.
The Hubble main computer shut down June 13, placing all instruments in safe mode. Each piece of Hubble's hardware has a twin pre-installed on the telescope in case it fails.
So engineers just had to switch to that backup hardware. NASA has rebooted Hubble using this type of operation in the past. In , after a computer crash took the telescope offline for two weeks, engineers switched over to redundant hardware. A year later, astronauts repaired two broken instruments while in orbit — that was Hubble's fifth and final servicing operation.
NASA no longer has a way to launch astronauts to the space telescope. You have to make sure that your command uploads are going to do exactly what you intend them to do," Paul Hertz, director of NASA's astrophysics division, told Insider last week. It didn't help that engineers couldn't just switch over the malfunctioning PCU.
The unit is linked to lots of other components, so NASA had to switch over other hardware, too. The agency also used the backup payload computer instead of the original, just to be safe. It powered up correctly, engineers loaded it with up-to-date software, and now it's in "normal operations mode," NASA said in its Friday update. Now the Hubble team has to start powering up the telescope's science instruments. It could take as long as a week to return to full operations, according to Hertz.
This was later called the Hubble Deep Field. Some of the galaxies were so young, they had not yet begun serious star formation. Other deep field observations in the same area were performed, peering deeper into space each time. In addition to gazing at the early universe, Hubble also helped astronomers gauge how much time had passed since the Big Bang.
By measuring a special kind of pulsing star known as a Cepheid variable , they were able to narrow down the age of the universe from its pre-HST range of 10 to 20 billion years to a more precise Hubble also examines individual stars in various stages of their evolution — from the clouds of dust that form infant stars to the corpses of those long since detonated, and those in between. It has even been able to peer outside of our galaxy, the Milky Way, and into its neighbors, the Magellanic Clouds and Andromeda Galaxy.
Related: The most amazing Hubble Space Telescope discoveries. More challenging to see than stars are planets orbiting other suns. Yet in , Hubble captured pictures of the planet Fomalhaut b, the first time an extrasolar planet was directly imaged in visible light. But most planets are more challenging to photograph.
Much of the HST's work with other planets comes through the detection of their atmosphere as they pass in front of their sun; the atmosphere filters the light from the stars, and the Hubble records the changes. Hubble may spend much of its time peering light-years from Earth, but on occasion it takes the time to photograph the planets traveling around our sun. High resolution images taken of Jupiter, Saturn and even Pluto can provide insights that can only be topped by planetary probes circling the planets.
Images from the HST allows scientists on Earth to monitor changes in the planet's atmosphere and surface. When the comet Shoemaker-Levy crashed into the Jupiter in , Hubble photographed the fatal collision. The aftermath revealed a great deal about the gas giant's atmosphere. Further, Hubble has seen what appears to be water plumes erupting from the moon Europa , a moon of Jupiter. The telescope made an initial observation in March and then saw a follow-up candidate plume in the same location in February In orbit for more than two decades, Hubble has provided scientists with a greater understanding of the planets, galaxy, and the whole universe.
Among the m ost amazing Hubble discoveries and research projects:. Find more in this gallery of awesome Hubble pictures.
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