NASA, ESA, STScI
To mark the 34th anniversary of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA released this photo of the Little Dumbbell Nebula. Also known as Messier 76, the nebula is 3,400 light-years away from Earth.
ESA/Hubble/NASA/J. Dalcanton
Hubble captured an image of three galaxies in a tug-of-war millions of light-years from Earth. This system is known as Arp 195 and was included in the Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies.
ESA/STScI/NASA
Hubble took this image of the rare blue variable star AG Carinae, located 20,000 light-years away from Earth in the Milky Way galaxy, to celebrate the 31st anniversary of its launch. The star has experienced several explosions that created its distinctive halo.
NASA
The Orion Nebula is 1,500 light-years from Earth and is located in Orion's Belt in the constellation Orion. It's one of the brightest nebulae -- and on a clear, dark night it's visible to the naked eye. The nebula is Earth's nearest star-forming region.
NASA
The Hubble Space Telescope was launched from the space shuttle Discovery on April 24, 1990.
NASA
Hubble has given us many images of our neighbor Mars. This image was taken in 2003 when Mars made its closest approach in nearly 60,000 years. On August 27, 2003, the two worlds were only 34.6 million miles apart from center to center. By contrast, Mars can be about 249 million miles away from Earth.
NASA
Hubble snapped this image in 2007 of Ganymede appearing to peek out from beneath Jupiter. Ganymede is the largest moon in our solar system, and it's even bigger than Mercury.
NASA
Hubble captured this image of Saturn in 2004, a view so sharp that some of the planet's smaller rings are visible.
NASA
Hubble tracked clouds on Uranus in this image taken in 1997. The image is a composite of three near-infrared images. The planet's rings are prominent in the near infrared. Eight of Uranus' 27 moons can be seen in both images. Uranus is about 1.75 billion miles from Earth.
NASA
Hubble captured this image of the distant blue-green world Neptune in 2005. Fourteen different colored filters were used to help scientists learn more about Neptune's atmosphere. Neptune is about 2.8 billion miles from Earth.
NASA
Hubble discovered four of Pluto's five moons. In 2005: Nix and Hydra were found. Hubble discovered Kerberos in 2011 and Styx in 2012. The new discoveries joined Pluto's large moon, Charon, which was discovered in 1978. Styx was found by scientists using Hubble to search for potential hazards for the New Horizons spacecraft which flew by Pluto in July 2015. Pluto is about 2.9 billion miles from Earth.
NASA
The iconic Horsehead Nebula is a favorite target for astronomers. Look carefully and you'll see what looks like the head of a horse rising into the stars. This Hubble image captures the nebula in infrared wavelengths. The nebula is 1,600 light-years from Earth.
NASA
The Cat's Eye Nebula is a bunch of glowing gases kicked out into space by a dying star. This Hubble Space Telescope image shows details of structures including jets of high-speed gas and unusual knots of gas. This color picture is a composite of three images taken at different wavelengths. The nebula is estimated to be 1,000 years old. It's about 3,000 light years from Earth in the constellation Draco.
NASA
The Bug, or Butterfly Nebula looks like a butterfly with its wings stretching across the galaxy. It's actually a cloud of roiling gas shed by a dying star. Scientists say the gas is more than 36,000 degrees Fahrenheit and is expanding into space at more than 600,000 miles an hour. This image was taken with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, a camera installed on Hubble during its May 2009 upgrade by shuttle astronauts. The nebula is about 3,800 light years away in the constellation Scorpius.
NASA
Astronomers combined several Hubble images taken in 2014 to create an upgraded view of the Hubble's iconic 1995 "Pillars of Creation" image. The new image shows a wider view of the pillars, which stretch about 5 light-years high. The pillars are part of a small region of the Eagle Nebula, which is about 6,500 light years from Earth.
NASA
This huge nebula is 7,500 light years from Earth in the constellation Carina. It's one of the largest and brightest nebulas and is a nursery for new stars. It also has several stars estimated to be at least 50 to 100 times the mass of our Sun, including Eta Carinae, one of the brightest stars known and one of the most massive stars in the Milky Way Galaxy.
NASA
One of the closest neighbors to our own Milky Way, the Andromeda Galaxy, can be seen with the naked eye if you know where to look on a clear, dark night. In 2012, scientists using data from Hubble predicted Andromeda would collide with the Milky Way in about four billion years. Andromeda is 2.5 million light years from Earth.
NASA
The Cigar Galaxy is 12 million light years away. It gets its name from its shape: From Earth it looks like an elongated elliptical disc.
NASA
It's called one of the most photogenic galaxies: The Sombrero Galaxy looks like the giant broad rim of a Mexican hat sitting out among the stars. It can be spotted using a small telescope. It's about 28 million light years from Earth.
NASA
This group of galaxies is about 290 million light years from Earth. It's named for its discoverer, French astronomer Edouard Stephan, who first spotted it in 1877.
NASA
Hubble captured this image of a group of interacting galaxies called Arp 273. The bigger galaxy has a center disk that is distorted into a rose-like shape by the pull from its partner below.
NASA
In 2004, astronomers unveiled the deepest portrait of the visible universe ever taken to date. Called the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field, the million-second-long exposure shows the first galaxies to emerge shortly after the Big Bang. The image shows an estimated 10,000 galaxies. In 2012, astronomers assembled an upgraded image called the Hubble eXtreme Deep Field. It combined 10 years of Hubble Space Telescope photographs taken of a patch of sky at the center of the original Hubble Ultra-Deep Field. The new image contains about 5,500 galaxies.
NASA
This 2018 Hubble image shows the Lagoon Nebula, a chaotic nursery full of baby stars. At the center of this image, a young star 200,000 times brighter than our sun blasts out ultraviolet radiation.
NASA
Even stars like to blow bubbles. This 2016 image shares Hubble's view of the Bubble Nebula, where a superhot, massive star is blowing a giant bubble into space. The nebula is 7 light-years across.
NASA
The Cone Nebula is a turbulent star-forming pillar of gas and dust. It's 7 light-years long, but this image taken by Hubble in 2002 shows the top 2.5 light-years (which equals 23 million round trips to the moon). Ultraviolet radiation causes the hydrogen gas to emit an eerie red glow.
NASA
This is a detailed look at the section of a slowly expanding supernova, or the remains of an exploded star. Hubble took this image in 2015 of the Veil Nebula 2,100 light-years away. The star was once 20 times more massive than our sun, but only wisps of gas remain.
NASA
In 2009, NASA's Great Observatories, including Hubble along with the Spitzer Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory, combined their observational power to create this unprecedented composite image of our Milky Way galaxy's center. Infrared and X-ray light captured by the telescopes can be seen here. Hubble's contributions are in yellow, Spitzer's observations are in red and Chandra's are blue and violet.
NASA
Hubble also teamed up with Spitzer to create this stunning image of the Orion Nebula in 2006. The image combines visible, infrared and ultraviolet light. A community of massive stars is represented by the yellow at the heart of the image.
NASA
Hubble captured this view of an expanding light halo around the star V838 Monocerotis in 2004.
NASA
M83 is a nearby spiral galaxy, and this 2014 Hubble image showcases its thousands of clusters of stars and supernova remnants. The young stars can be seen in pink bubbles of hydrogen gas.
NASA
This infrared light image taken by Hubble in 2014 shows the Monkey Head Nebula, where starbirth is occurring 6,400 light-years away from us. Dust clouds and glowing gas swirl together here, representing the ingredients for forming stars.
NASA
This ultraviolet light observation of the giant Eta Carinae star was taken by Hubble in 2019. The star is the larger out of two that orbit each other. It's known to have violent outbursts, as evidenced by the bubbles here.
NASA
Fireworks are even more beautiful in space. Hubble captured this image of a giant cluster of 3,000 stars in 2015. It's called Westerlund 2, located 20,000 light-years away from Earth.

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CNN  — 

The Hubble Space Telescope will transition to a new way of operating that aims to prevent the space observatory from experiencing lapses in its ability to observe the universe, according to NASA officials.

The storied telescope, which has captured breathtaking images of the cosmos for 34 years, has traditionally operated using six gyroscopes. These gyroscopes, or gyros, are part of a system that controls and determines the direction the telescope is pointed in, said Mark Clampin, director of the Astrophysics Division within NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, during a news conference Tuesday.

As Hubble shifts in direction to capture images of exoplanets, galaxies and other celestial phenomena, the gyros measure the rate of the telescope’s movement so it arrives in the right place for the next science observation, Clampin said.

As the telescope has aged, the gyros have required replacement, and six new gyros were installed during the final Hubble servicing mission that astronauts aboard a NASA space shuttle conducted in 2009.

NASA
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope eyes the universe in May 2009 after one of the space shuttle missions to service the space observatory.

Over time, some of the gyros have stopped functioning, but three have remained operational, making no change to how the telescope operates — until now.

Faulty readings disrupt Hubble

Over the past six months, one of the three remaining gyroscopes has been returning faulty readings that have caused the telescope to enter “safe mode” multiple times and cease its observations of the universe, Clampin said.

The Hubble team has been able to reset the gyro from the ground, but these fixes have been temporary, and the problem has appeared more frequently, said Patrick Crouse, the Hubble Space Telescope’s project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

The telescope entered safe mode on May 24 after another faulty event with the problematic gyro, and it remains that way, Crouse said.

After careful consideration, the Hubble team decided to operate Hubble using a single gyro, and the other functioning gyro will be kept in reserve for future use, Clampin said.

The team has long considered shifting the telescope to one-gyro mode to prolong its lifespan after developing the plan more than 20 years ago.

“We believe this is our best approach to support Hubble science through this decade and into the next since most of the observations in space will be completely unaffected by this change,” Clampin said.

Hubble operated in two-gyro mode from 2005 to 2009, and one-gyro mode for a short time in 2008 with no impact on the quality of science observations, according to the agency.

The future of Hubble’s observations

The change doesn’t come without limitations, Crouse said.

The telescope will need more time to shift and lock onto the objects it is observing, which reduces its efficiency and flexibility. It also won’t be able to track moving objects that are closer to Earth than Mars, but historically, Hubble has rarely observed such targets, Crouse said.

Now, the team will reconfigure both the telescope and the ground system that sends information to Hubble. The goal is to restore Hubble to routine observations by mid-June.

Previously, there was a feasibility study to assess how commercial partners could help boost Hubble to a higher orbit to buy the telescope more operational time so Earth’s atmosphere doesn’t tug it down for a controlled reentry in the 2030s. The agency is looking at the risks and requirements of such a maneuver but is not moving forward with any plans of a “reboost” at this time, Clampin said.

Hubble is expected to operate into the mid-2030s, with its cosmic observations providing a complement to the work of the James Webb Space Telescope and future observatories that haven’t launched yet, Clampin said.

“We do not see Hubble as being on its last legs,” Crouse said, “and we think it’s a very capable observatory.”