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NASA Unveils Images From Hubble's Newest Camera
By Deborah Zabarenko
Reuters
WASHINGTON (April 30) - NASA unveiled images of a galactic tadpole, a pair of monster mice, a nursery for newborn stars and a giant pillar of dust on Tuesday in the first batch of pictures snapped by Hubble Space Telescope's newest camera.
All four detailed images of the distant universe were produced by the Advanced Camera for Surveys, which is operating superbly after its installation in March, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
As spectacular as the central subjects of the photographs are, the background is of critical importance to astronomers.
What appear as jewel-toned pinwheels, ovals and diamonds on the blackness of space are actually faraway galaxies. The sharpness of these images will allow scientists to study the furthest reaches of the universe.
''We are looking back across 90 percent of the age of the universe,'' Johns Hopkins University astronomer Holland Ford, the lead investigator on the project, said by telephone.
''We are seeing galaxies that we estimate formed within 1 billion years of the birth of the universe. What a happy surprise to see these galaxies stretching back almost to the beginning of time,'' Ford said.
Many scientists believe the universe began with a monstrous explosion, called the big bang, some 14 billion years ago.
Hubble, launched 12 years ago at a cost of about $2.2 billion, has looked back in time before, notably in a famous image known as the Hubble Deep Field, which was like a visual core sample of the universe made in 1995. But the advanced survey camera has extremely high resolution and is examining a patch of sky with twice the area of the Hubble field.
Ford said each of the images released has nearly 17 million pixels, compared to 5 million pixels it would have had if taken by a high-end consumer camera.
TURBO-CHARGED TELESCOPE
Looking at a tiny area of the sky -- the size of two grains of sand held at arm's length -- the new camera has captured astonishing views of galaxies with a 10-fold increase in efficiency over previous Hubble instruments.
''This is like putting a turbo-charger on it,'' Garth Illingworth, an astronomer on the project, told Reuters.
One image of a galaxy 420 million light-years away in the constellation Draco was dubbed ''The Tadpole'' because of its long streaky tail that stretched more than 280,000 light-years.
Its distorted shape was caused by a hit-and-run interloper:
a tiny blue galaxy that slammed through the larger galaxy and is now shown leaving the scene, NASA said.
A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, about 6 trillion miles (10 trillion km).
A couple of other long-tailed galaxies some 300 million light-years away appeared to be warily circling one another, so astronomers nicknamed them ''The Mice.'' More than celestial rodents, these two galaxies are destined to merge into one massive galaxy, NASA researchers said.
They may also foretell the eventual fate of the Milky Way galaxy, which contains Earth. Computer simulations indicate the Milky Way is likely to collide in several billion years with its nearest galactic neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy.
The new camera also captured images of what looks a bit like a nightmare sea monster, rearing up out of red waves. In reality it was only a massive pillar of gas and dust known as the Cone Nebula, a relatively nearby feature at 2,500 light-years' distance.
A star nursery at the heart of the Omega Nebula, some 5,500 light-years away, was also displayed.
Reut13:01 04-30-02
Should this link not work the first time, just give it a few seconds and try it again. It goes straight to the new pix.
http://hubblesite.org/news_.and._views/pr.cgi.2002.11
By Deborah Zabarenko
Reuters
WASHINGTON (April 30) - NASA unveiled images of a galactic tadpole, a pair of monster mice, a nursery for newborn stars and a giant pillar of dust on Tuesday in the first batch of pictures snapped by Hubble Space Telescope's newest camera.
All four detailed images of the distant universe were produced by the Advanced Camera for Surveys, which is operating superbly after its installation in March, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
As spectacular as the central subjects of the photographs are, the background is of critical importance to astronomers.
What appear as jewel-toned pinwheels, ovals and diamonds on the blackness of space are actually faraway galaxies. The sharpness of these images will allow scientists to study the furthest reaches of the universe.
''We are looking back across 90 percent of the age of the universe,'' Johns Hopkins University astronomer Holland Ford, the lead investigator on the project, said by telephone.
''We are seeing galaxies that we estimate formed within 1 billion years of the birth of the universe. What a happy surprise to see these galaxies stretching back almost to the beginning of time,'' Ford said.
Many scientists believe the universe began with a monstrous explosion, called the big bang, some 14 billion years ago.
Hubble, launched 12 years ago at a cost of about $2.2 billion, has looked back in time before, notably in a famous image known as the Hubble Deep Field, which was like a visual core sample of the universe made in 1995. But the advanced survey camera has extremely high resolution and is examining a patch of sky with twice the area of the Hubble field.
Ford said each of the images released has nearly 17 million pixels, compared to 5 million pixels it would have had if taken by a high-end consumer camera.
TURBO-CHARGED TELESCOPE
Looking at a tiny area of the sky -- the size of two grains of sand held at arm's length -- the new camera has captured astonishing views of galaxies with a 10-fold increase in efficiency over previous Hubble instruments.
''This is like putting a turbo-charger on it,'' Garth Illingworth, an astronomer on the project, told Reuters.
One image of a galaxy 420 million light-years away in the constellation Draco was dubbed ''The Tadpole'' because of its long streaky tail that stretched more than 280,000 light-years.
Its distorted shape was caused by a hit-and-run interloper:
a tiny blue galaxy that slammed through the larger galaxy and is now shown leaving the scene, NASA said.
A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, about 6 trillion miles (10 trillion km).
A couple of other long-tailed galaxies some 300 million light-years away appeared to be warily circling one another, so astronomers nicknamed them ''The Mice.'' More than celestial rodents, these two galaxies are destined to merge into one massive galaxy, NASA researchers said.
They may also foretell the eventual fate of the Milky Way galaxy, which contains Earth. Computer simulations indicate the Milky Way is likely to collide in several billion years with its nearest galactic neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy.
The new camera also captured images of what looks a bit like a nightmare sea monster, rearing up out of red waves. In reality it was only a massive pillar of gas and dust known as the Cone Nebula, a relatively nearby feature at 2,500 light-years' distance.
A star nursery at the heart of the Omega Nebula, some 5,500 light-years away, was also displayed.
Reut13:01 04-30-02
Should this link not work the first time, just give it a few seconds and try it again. It goes straight to the new pix.
http://hubblesite.org/news_.and._views/pr.cgi.2002.11