Great Observatories program

It might be the end of the road for two of NASA’s most iconic telescopes as the space agency looks to reduce the funding for the Hubble Space Telescope and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, much to the dismay of scientists who rely heavily on the cosmic observations of the missions.The Fujifilm X100VI is the Most Fun I’ve Had With a Camera in YearsShortly after the fate of its 2024 budget was sealed, NASA released its budget proposal for 2025, requesting $1.58 billion for its astrophysics division. Despite the 3% increase…

Photo: NASACrew-7, consisting of (from left to right) Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov, ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen of Denmark, NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, and JAXA astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, are shown posing in their pressure suits. The crew, which arrived at the ISS on August 27, 2023, will don these suits again later this month when they return to Earth aboard the SpaceX Dragon Endurance. Photo: NASACrew-7, consisting of (from left to right) Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov, ESA astronaut…

The Einstein Probe, an X-ray telescope managed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, will be ready to launch next month. The probe will look for transient events in X-ray light and try to answer some fundamental questions about black holes and gravitational waves.Gizmodo’s Top Five Gadgets of 2023Hubble, Chandra, Spitzer, and Webb. Undoubtedly iconic names, but now, in a long overdue development, we’re finally going to have a space-based telescope named after the famed German-born theoretical physicist, Albert Einstein.The…

Space is an inky black yonder... but for the countless light sources that pepper the billions of light-years that human instruments can see. Thanks to ground-based telescopes and observatories parked millions of miles from Earth, 2023 has been a terrific year for space imagery. Astronomers captured fascinating new…Read more... Space is an inky black yonder... but for the countless light sources that pepper the billions of light-years that human instruments can see. Thanks to ground-based telescopes and observatories…

NASA is addressing an issue with a Hubble Space Telescope gyroscope that prompted the observatory to enter safe mode on November 23. Science operations have been suspended as a result, but the space agency doesn’t seem too worried.“Even AI Rappers are Harassed by Police” | AI UnlockedHubble, launched on April 24, 1990, and renowned for its significant contributions to astronomy, is experiencing a technical issue with one of its gyroscopes, according to a NASA statement. The space telescope, operating in low Earth orbit,…

The Hubble Space Telescope just ogled an exoplanet passing in front of a star in a triple system, revealing the nearby world’s mass.Webb Telescope Images the Pillars of CreationThe world is named LTT 1445Ac, and it was discovered in 2022 by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The world orbits a red dwarf star (one in a set of three) that is 22 light-years from Earth, in the constellation Eridanus. LTT 1445Ac shares its host star with two larger planets.TESS doesn’t have the optical resolution necessary to…

The Hubble Space Telescope images the cosmos from low Earth orbit, but an abundance of artificial satellites circlethe planet at higher altitudes. That’s become an irritation in recent years, as the thousands of devices leave bright streaks in Hubble imagery.Astronomers Could Soon Get Warnings When SpaceX Satellites Threaten Their ViewNow, researchers with the Space Telescope Science Institute have developed a tool to identify the telltale trails satellites leave in Hubble images taken by the telescope’s Advanced Camera…

The Webb Space Telescope is on a tear, imaging regions of star formation across the cosmos. Its latest target? The barred spiral galaxy NGC 5068—a bedazzled conglomeration of gas and stars 17 million light-years from Earth.Webb Telescope Images the Pillars of CreationLaunched in December 2021, Webb has been making scientific observations since July 2022. It’s uniquely capable of seeing some of the oldest, most distant light, which it does at infrared wavelengths. Taking data on this ancient light clues astronomers into…

Four remarkable cosmic scenes were recently imaged by four NASA space observatories—the Webb Space Telescope, Chandra X-ray Observatory, Spitzer Space Telescope, and Hubble Space Telescope—to showcase the objects as never before.First Full-Color Images From Webb Space TelescopeThese powerful telescopes, alongside a few others, including the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton observatory, recently had their imagery compiled by NASA image scientists, to produce unique portraits of well-known objects.The observatories…

An artist’s rendering of the planet, called LP 791-18 d.Illustration: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Chris Smith (KRBwyle)On this world, the floor is lava and there’s no couch to jump to: Astronomers have described a planet that might be completely covered in active volcanoes. What Is Planet Nine and Why Can’t We Find It?Data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite and the now deactivated Spitzer Space Telescope revealed an Earth-size rocky planet with some extreme features.The planet, called LP 791-18 d,…