Astronomers will get another six to seven years out of their prized asset, the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA officials announced Tuesday.
Hubble Servicing Mission 4 is tentatively on the books for early 2008, when astronauts will deliver two additional instruments and replace aging batteries, gyroscopes and other electronics to keep the telescope in orbit through 2013.
“The desire to preserve a truly international asset like the Hubble Space Telescope makes doing this mission the right course of action,” NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said during an announcement at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt.
Astronomers at Johns Hopkins, the Space Telescope Science Institute and around the world have used Hubble to push the boundaries of knowledge of the universe and provide some of the most breathtaking images of the cosmos.
Hubble data set the age of the universe to within 200 million years ? at 13.7 billion ? established the existence of a mysterious dark energy driving the expansion of the universe and detected effects of that dark energy as stars implode.
Situated 360 miles above the Earth?s surface, Hubble is not subject to the atmospheric distortion that limits ground-based telescopes? abilities.
“Hubble has been rewriting astronomy textbooks for more than 15 years, and all of us are looking forward to the new chapters that will be added with future discoveries and insights about our universe,” said Mary Cleave, NASA associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate.
“Hubble?s best and most productive period is ahead of it, not behind it,” said Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., who fought to keep the Hubble program alive.
“It is Hubble that started this ?Golden Age? of exploration and discovery, and it is Hubble that has become America?s icon for exploration and discovery,” Mikulski said.
HUBBLE ADDITIONS
Two new instruments will be added to the Hubble:
» The Wide Field Camera 3 will search the heavens for newly forming galaxies during the early stages of the universe and further explore dark energy and dark matter ? a mysterious substance scientists think makes up the bulk of the mass of the universe.
» The Cosmic Origins Spectrograph is expected to give astrophysicists a more detailed understanding of the superstructure of the cosmos and detect young hot stars buried in the thick dust clouds that gave rise to their birth.
