Hubble's Science Instruments

THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE'S SCIENCE INSTRUMENTS

The Hubble Space Telescope is a well-equipped observatory, in some ways the most powerful telescope ever sent into space. Its mirrors direct light from astronomical objects to various detectors. The suite of scientific instruments includes cameras, spectrographs to split up and analyze the light, and sensors that help to point the telescope and also measure the distances of astronomical objects.

The instruments have been designed to be serviced in orbit. During periodic visits by Space Shuttle astronauts, new instruments can be exchanged for old ones, batteries and many other components can be replaced, and newer technology can be installed.

In 1994 the planet Jupiter was bombarded by 20 separate fragments of comet Shoemaker Levy 9. The Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Planetary Camera II captured a series of images of this event, some showing "footprints" of dark debris flung high into Jupiter's atmosphere.

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One of the main goals of the Hubble Space Telescope is to observe, in great detail, galaxies extremely far from Earth. Almost all the objects visible in this Hubble "deep field" image are vast assemblies of stars. Most of the galaxies here appear small and faint because they are so far away that their light took many billions of years to reach Earth. Hundreds of these distant galaxies had never been seen before.

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More information on the history, mission, and current status of the Hubble Space Telescope is presented in the Explore the Universe gallery.

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