The Hubble Telescope sent back to Earth its first photo after changing its operating method

The Hubble Space Telescope recently encountered some operating troubles, leading to scientists being forced to change the way the telescope works to compensate for some hardware components that have failed. degraded and is now unable to operate effectively.

According to initial assessments, the three gyroscopes that help the telescope switch between different observing targets in the sky have encountered problems, one gyro in particular has been frequently broken in recent months. NASA decided to change Hubble's 'targeting' method, using only one gyroscope at a time instead of all three as before, in order to 'preserve' the remaining two gyroscopes as long as possible.

This change means that Hubble's ability to switch between targets will now be slower, and some targets (such as objects very close to Earth) will no longer be observable. But the good news is that Hubble is still able to maintain normal operations and produce stunning images of space - including the image below. This is one of the first images taken since Hubble switched to a new operating mode.

In addition to proving that Hubble is still operating stably and can continue to serve scientific research, this image also shows the beauty of galaxy NGC 1546 and the impressive gas plumes swirling around the galaxy's center. . The dust is reddish-brown in color due to light penetrating from the bright, yellow-glowing center of the galaxy. The blue region in this image is where hot, young stars are forming.

The Hubble Telescope was launched in 1990 and has now been in space for 30 years. Therefore, it is inevitable that hardware systems will degrade and have problems. There were a total of five times astronauts approached Hubble maintenance directly in space. The most recent mission took place in 2009. Since then, all maintenance activities for Hubble have been performed remotely from the ground.

Kareem Winters

Update 10 July 2024