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Latest News
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Globular Clusters Tell Tale of Star Formation in Nearby Galaxy Metropolis |
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Globular star clusters, dense bunches of hundreds of thousands of stars, have some of the oldest surviving stars in the universe. A new study of globular clusters outside our Milky Way Galaxy has found evidence that these hardy pioneers are more likely to form in dense areas, where star birth occurs at a rapid rate, instead of uniformly from galaxy to galaxy. Astronomers used NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to identify over 11,000 globular clusters in the Virgo cluster of galaxies. Most are older than 5 billion years. The sharp vision of Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys resolved the star clusters in 100 galaxies of various sizes, shapes, and brightnesses, even in faint, dwarf galaxies. The images in this photo show four members of the Virgo cluster of galaxies. Comprised of over 2,000 galaxies, the Virgo cluster is the nearest large galaxy cluster to Earth, located about 54 million light-years away. |
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Around The Institute
Webb Telescope Approved for Development/Launch
On July 10, 2008, NASA formally approved the JWST project to move into its implementation phase. This decision followed a successful Preliminary Design
Review (PDR) in March 2008 and a Non-Advocate Review in April. While all the science instruments and the "long lead" items like the primary mirror segments
are already being manufactured, this approval marks the transition of the program into Phase C (Final Design and Fabrication). Phase D covers system
assembly, integration and testing and launch. Read more...
Hubble Servicing Mission 4
Hubble precisely measured the age of the universe. It found evidence of dark energy. It brought you images of distant
galaxies in the young universe. And now, with the state-of-the-art instruments delivered by Servicing Mission 4 (SM4),
the Hubble Space Telescope will look onto the universe with new eyes, surpassing even its previous vision. Hubble was
designed to be repaired and upgraded by astronauts, and these servicing missions have occurred several times since
Hubble’s launch in 1990. NASA has selected a crew for the upcoming servicing, and the astronauts have begun
training. Read more...
IAU Symposium 258: The Ages of Stars
How old is that star? That is one of the most difficult questions to answer in galactic astrophysics. Stellar ages
lie at the heart of astrophysics, and stellar evolution is all about time and how stars change with time. Stellar
and galactic evolution cannot be understood without some knowledge of ages. Now is an appropriate time to examine
the problem of stellar ages in detail. IAU Symposium 258 will bring together astronomers from the around the world to discuss
the current state of the problem of estimating ages of individual stars and of populations, where the advances are now being made,
and what the near future offers. Read more...
Hubble Legacy Archive
We are pleased to announce that the Hubble Legacy Archive (HLA) has entered
the Data Release 1 (DR1) phase of operation. The HLA is an augmentation of
the Hubble Space Telescope data archive service. The goal of the archive is to
optimize the science derived from the telescope by providing improved browsing
capabilities and easy access to both standard and enhanced Hubble data
products. The Hubble Legacy Archive currently contains data from the ACS, WFPC2,
NICMOS, STIS, FOS, and GHRS instruments. The HLA project is a collaboration
between the Space Telescope Science Institute, the Space Telescope European
Coordinating Facility, and the Canadian Astronomy Data Centre.
Read more...
The Space Telescope Science Institute is operated for NASA
by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy.