Announcements 2012

18 December 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, Dr Joe Liske (aka Dr J) invites us to tour NGC 5189, a planetary nebula in our galaxy. The nebula looks like a ribbon in space, with a complex structure that comes from the dying throes of a Sun-like star at its centre. Credits ESA/HubbleVisual design and editing: Martin KornmesserWeb and technical support: Mathias Andre and Raquel Yumi ShidaWritten by: Oli UsherNarrator: Sara Mendes da CostaPresented by: Dr Joe Liske (Dr J)Images: NASA, ESA,, Digitized Sky Survey 2Music: John StanfordDirected by: Oli UsherExecutive producer: Lars Lindberg Christensen

14 December 2012: A calendar featuring Hubble’s most amazing pictures of the last year is now available to download for free. With pictures of galaxies, stars and nebulae, the 2013 Hubble Space Telescope calendar is guaranteed to brighten up every month. The calendar is available to download in a number of formats including PDF, JPEG and TIFF, and can easily be printed at home or at a print shop, as it is made available under a Creative Commons License.

6 December 2012: Episode 60 of the Hubblecast explores NGC 922, a galaxy that has been hit square-on by another. Ripples of star-formation are still propagating out across thousands of light-years of space over 300 million years after the collision, making it a prime example of what astronomers call a collisional ring galaxy. Credit ESA/HubbleVisual design and editing: Martin KornmesserWeb and technical support: Mathias Andre and Raquel Yumi ShidaWritten by: Oli UsherNarrator: Sara Mendes da CostaImages: NASA, ESA, Chandra X-ray Observatory, Digitized Sky Survey 2Visualisations and animations: B. Conn (MPIA), R. Smith (University of Concepción), R. Taylor (Arecibo Observatory); M. KornmesserMusic: Toomas ErmDirected by: Oli UsherExecutive producer: Lars Lindberg Christensen

27 November 2012: The Hubblecast, ESA’s popular vodcast which explores the Universe through the discoveries of the Hubble Space Telescope, is now available with subtitles. Future episodes will be published with embedded subtitles in English, plus a selection of other languages submitted by a team of volunteer translators. Work on subtitling the archive of past episodes has already begun and will be ongoing during the coming year. To view subtitles, just click the “CC” (closed captioning) button, or select “audio and subtitles” from the control menu in iTunes. (You may need to re-download certain episodes to get the latest subtitles.) Full information on how to watch Hubblecast with subtitles, how to make them work with alternative software, and on how to contribute translations, is on the subtitles web page. To sign up to our volunteer translators' email list and get notice of new episodes, click here.

12 November 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, we do away with Hubble’s stunning pictures of the cosmos, and focus on one of the telescope’s most important — but least known — functions. Like a digital camera, Hubble’s cameras produce colour images by sampling just a handful of colours and combining them together into one picture. The detail is extraordinary — but while the colours are accurate enough for the human eye, they are not good enough for some kinds of scientific work, such as the study of distant galaxies and extrasolar planets.  For much of their research, astronomers use Hubble’s spectrometers, devices that split up light into a rainbow of component colours, to reveal many of the hidden properties of the Universe. These observing methods may not produce attractive images, but they lie behind some of the most profound science that Hubble does. In this episode, presenter Joe Liske (aka Dr …

16 October 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, Joe Liske (aka Dr J) shows how a team of astronomers has used Hubble and a battery of other telescopes to discover the secrets of massive galaxy cluster MACS J0717. They have discovered that an invisible filament of dark matter extends out of the cluster. This is our first direct glimpse of the scaffolding that gives the Universe its structure.

24 August 2012: An updated version of the popular ESA/Hubble Top 100 Images app is now available to download from iTunes. The new version takes full advantage of the third generation iPad’s retina display and quad core graphics. The free app transforms the iPad into an exciting window to the Universe and allows users to enjoy one hundred of the best images taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, as well as giving users the chance to learn more about astronomy from captions and extra information that is just a tap away. Thanks to the super-sharp retina display technology (containing 1 million more pixels than HDTV) these pictures look more spectacular than ever. Other new features include an index, allowing users to skip to individual images, as well as a smoother, cleaner slide show option accompanied by a brand new soundtrack from John Stanford. Feel the Universe at your fingertips by downloading the …

23 August 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, Joe Liske (aka Dr J) presents the winners of the Hidden Treasures image processing competition. In May 2012, we asked members of the public to delve into Hubble's vast science archive to uncover pictures that had never been seen outside of the scientific community — and then to try their hand at processing the scientific data into attractive images. This episode presents the top ten images from the several thousand submitted.

23 August 2012: Hubble has made over a million observations since launch, but only a small proportion are attractive images — and an even smaller number are ever actually seen by anyone outside the small groups of scientists that publish them. But the vast amount of data in the archive means that there are still many hundreds of beautiful images scattered among the valuable, but visually unattractive, scientific data that have never been enjoyed by the public. We call these pictures Hubble’s hidden treasures, and a few months ago, we invited the public to look through Hubble’s science archive to help us find them. The response was impressive, with almost 3000 submissions. More than a thousand of these images were fully processed: a difficult and time-consuming task. We’ve already started featuring the best of these in our Hubble Picture of the Week series. And to say thanks, we’re awarding prizes for the best …

1 August 2012: In April and May, ESA/Hubble invited the public to search through the archive and uncover hidden treasures (ann1203). These are Hubble images that have never been published, and have only ever been seen by a handful of scientists up to now. The response was overwhelming: almost 3000 submissions in two categories, for basic image searching in the archive, and advanced image processing using professional software. So it’s taken some time to collect and classify all the submissions. But now it’s time to decide who gets the prizes! The judges are hard at work looking through the submissions to decide who wins the top award. But we also want the public to have a say, with a people’s choice category which anyone can vote for. You can now vote on the images in both categories: The shortlist and voting page for the advanced image processing category is here. The shortlist and …

16 July 2012: ESA’s Facebook community for the Hubble Space Telescope has recently welcomed its 100 000th member. We would like to thank all our friends for their curiosity about space, their interest in the Hubble Space Telescope and their support in sharing the wonders of the Universe with the world. Each of our Facebook friends acts as a Hubble ambassador every time they share one of our Facebook stories or images with their friends. Although it may seem like a small gesture, their efforts play a role in the bigger picture. To illustrate the importance of that role, ESA/Hubble is launching a “Hubble’s Friends” campaign. Today we have uploaded a special photo on our Facebook page, carrying the message “I’m a friend of Hubble”. From today until Sunday, 22 July, our Facebook friends can tag themselves in the image. As the number of Facebook tags per photo is limited, we have created …

28 June 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, Dr J (aka Dr Joe Liske) presents the latest discovery about HD 189733b, an exoplanet that has been repeatedly studied by Hubble. Observations taken in 2011 using Hubble and the Swift satellite showed a flare from the planet’s parent star scorching the upper atmosphere and driving it off into space. This is the first time that clear change has been observed in an exoplanet’s atmosphere. The observations give a tantalising glimpse of changing weather on planets outside our Solar System. Find out how to view and contribute subtitles for the Hubblecast in multiple languages, or translate this video on dotSUB.

22 June 2012: The European science archive for the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has been transferred to ESA’s European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC) in Villanueva de la Cañada near Madrid, Spain. This guarantees a permanent home for Hubble science data following the closure of the Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF), located at the headquarters of the European Southern Observatory near Munich, Germany. Prof Álvaro Gimenez Cañete, ESA’s Director of Science and Robotic Exploration said: “This year, European astronomers were awarded a record share of observing time with Hubble. Bringing the Hubble science archive to ESAC is part of ESA’s continuing commitment to European astronomers having access to the world’s most famous orbiting observatory.” In the latest allocation of observing time, in an open competition, European scientists were awarded 26.5% of Hubble orbits. Antonella Nota, ESA Hubble Project Scientist and Mission Manager explains: “ESA’s agreement with NASA guarantees 15% observing time for European …

31 May 2012: In this episode of the Hubblecast, scientists Jay Anderson and Roeland van der Marel show how they have used Hubble observations to predict the future of the Andromeda Galaxy and the Milky Way. Projecting the motion of Andromeda’s stars over the next 8 billion years, the astronomers now know the path that galaxy is taking through space. And it’s heading straight for us! Computer simulations based on Hubble observations show how the two galaxies will crash together in around 4 billion years’ time.

17 April 2012: To celebrate the 22nd anniversary of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope this month, episode 54 of the Hubblecast gives a slideshow of some of the best images from over two decades in orbit, set to specially commissioned music. Please note that although this episode does not have narration, the images are described in subtitles which can be displayed by clicking on the “CC” (closed captioning) button. Find out how to view and contribute subtitles for the Hubblecast in multiple languages, or translate this video on dotSUB. List of images and descriptions: 1990: SaturnAmong the first images to be sent back from Hubble after its launch in April 1990, this image of Saturn is good by the standards of ground-based telescopes, but slightly blurry. This is because of the well-publicised problem with Hubble’s mirror, which did not allow images to be focused properly. 1991: Orion NebulaAlthough not perfectly sharp, this early …

27 March 2012: Over two decades in orbit, the Hubble Space Telescope has made a huge number of observations. Every week, we publish new ones on the Hubble website. But hidden in Hubble’s huge data archives are some truly breathtaking images that have hardly ever been seen by anyone. In this episode, Dr J, aka Dr Joe Liske, explains what all this data is, what it’s for, and how you can take a look at it yourself. If you’re want to try your hand at looking through the archive for hidden treasures, why not enter our Hidden Treasures competition (competition closes 31 May 2012). Find a great dataset and you could win an iPod Touch, try your hand at processing the image and you could win an iPad. This Hubblecast is the first with specially composed music by Toomas Erm, head of the control engineering department at the European Southern Observatory. Credit ESA/Hubble …

27 March 2012: Over two decades in orbit, the Hubble Space Telescope has made a huge number of observations. Every week, we publish new images on the ESA/Hubble website. But hidden in Hubble’s huge data archives are still some truly breathtaking images that have never been seen in public. We call them Hubble’s Hidden Treasures — and we’re looking for your help to bring them to light.We’re inviting the public into Hubble’s vast science archive to dig out the best unseen Hubble images. Find a great dataset in the Hubble Legacy Archive, adjust the contrast and colours using the simple online tools and submit to our Hubble’s Hidden Treasures Contest Flickr group, and you could win an iPod Touch in our Hubble’s Hidden Treasures Competition.For an extra challenge, why not try using the same software that the professionals use to turn the Hubble data into breath-taking images? Download the data from the Hubble …

18 January 2012: The New York Times has included the Back in Time app developed by the company Landka among its Top 10 iPad apps in 2011. ESA/Hubble went into partnership with Landka to deliver content for this educational app, which is an animated history e-book that guides the reader through time from the first moments of the Universe’s history until the most recent events. ESA/Hubble contributed images and animations for the first four chapters: The Big Bang, The First Stars, The Milky Way and The Solar System. According to The New York Times: “The coolest history textbook you’ll find on the iPad, Back in Time tells the story of the Universe using a 24-hour clock, where the Big Bang starts the day and humans appear in the final seconds.” An intuitive interface allows the user to scroll quickly through time, entering any major event in the history of our civilisation. Each event …

17 January 2012: The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is famous for looking deep into the past of the Universe. But it can also predict the future. This episode of the Hubblecast takes us on a journey five billion years from now, to see the ultimate fate of the Solar System. Using stunning Hubble imagery of the death throes of Sun-like stars, narrator Joe Liske (aka Dr J) shows us what will happen when the Sun runs out of nuclear fuel — and how its wreckage will form the building blocks of new generations of stars. Credit ESA/Hubble Visual design and editing: Martin KornmesserWeb and technical support: Lars Holm Nielsen and Raquel Yumi ShidaWritten by: Oli UsherNarration: Joe Liske (Dr J)Images: NASA, ESAAnimations: Martin KornmesserMusic: Zero ProjectDirected by: Oli UsherExecutive Producer: Lars Lindberg Christensen