This iconic telescope is world-famous for its incredible images, which offer an insight into the vast tapestry that makes up the universe’s past.
Hubble will be replaced by the James Webb Space Telescope after 31 years of orbiting Earth, and following an extremely difficult year, which saw it go offline for many reasons.
While they may initially be able to work side-by-side, Hubble will soon be reduced and eventually shut down.
MailOnline has pulled out the most captivating Hubble images to celebrate three decades of discovering the secrets of the solar system.
Scroll down to view video
This image was taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 1995. It shows the iconic Pillars Of Creation. The visible-light image gives a more detailed view. Stretching roughly 4 to 5 light-years, the Pillars of Creation are a fascinating but relatively small feature of the entire Eagle Nebula, which spans 70 by 55 light-years and was discovered in 1745 by the Swiss astronomer Jean-Philippe Loys de Chéseaux
Hubble provides us with images not only of distant galaxies but also star clusters. Hubble is responsible for some of the most famous images of planets within our solar system. This includes Saturn (pictured). This image was taken June 20, 2019, as Saturn made its closest approach in 2019 to Earth.
Astronomers released the image from Hubble’s 26th Birthday in 2016 to commemorate the discovery. It shows a huge bubble that is being forced into space by an extremely hot, large star.
An image showing the formation of stars near our Milky Way galaxy was published to mark its 30th birthday in April 2013. This image showed the large red nebula NGC 2014 and its blue neighbor NGC 2020. They both live in the Large Magellanic Cloud (a satellite galaxy within the Milky Way 163,000 light years from Earth).
Hubble captured the Sombrero Galaxy, one of the most photographed galaxies in the universe. Its characteristic feature is the brightly colored, bulbous central region that’s surrounded by dense dust lanes and the spiral structure. Sombrero is located at the edge the Virgo group of galaxies. It is equivalent to 800 million suns.
Hubble (a NASA joint project, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canada Space Agency) has been observing the universe over the past 30 years.
Space telescope is one of the greatest scientific tools to date. The instrument has made 1.5 million observations of over 43,500 celestial bodies and published some 18,000 papers.
This has led to many important discoveries in astronomy including the observation of an acceleration of the Universe’s expansion.
The result was the conclusion that most of the cosmos is made up of mysterious dark energy — around 68 per cent, according to NASA.
Dark matter makes up about 27 per cent and the rest – everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter – adds up to less than 5 per cent of the universe.
Hubble first observed Jupiter, March 1991. It was a topic it returned to frequently.
This was also the first evidence that supermassive black hole centers exist in galaxies, after the observation of M87 in 1993.
Another important discovery is the “Pillars Of Creation”, a 1995 image that shows the powerful tendrils gas and dust within a starry nursery.
A fascinating photograph was released to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Observatory in April 2013. It shows a region that forms stars near our Milky Way galaxy.
This image showed the large red nebula NGC 2014 and its blue neighbor NGC 2020, which are both located in the Large Magellanic Cloud. It is a satellite galaxy within the Milky Way 163,000 light years from Earth.
Hubble made its first observations of Jupiter (pictured) on March 21, 1991. It was a subject Hubble returned to often.
Hubble captured the Crab Nebula, a remnant of a supernova in the Milky Way. Hubble took stunning colour and brightness photos of it.
Here’s a mosaic from Hubble that shows a region of hot star birth in the Monkey Head Nebula.
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured this colorful image in celebration of Earth’s 28th Anniversary of Viewing the Heavens. This gives us a seat at the amazing tapestry that is the universe’s stellar births and deaths.
It is 50-light years wide and shows the Carina Nebula’s centre, where many stars live and die. The 48 Hubble images were used to create it.
It is the dying star in the middle of dainty “butterfly wings”, made of roiling gas boiling at 36,000 Fahrenheit.
The 2,000-light-years distant planetary nebula IC418, which shines like a multifaceted gem, is dazzling in its beauty. It lies in Lepus constellation.
Two spiral galaxies are visible in the Canis Major constellation. They pass each other as if they were majestic ships at night. This image was published in 1999
This is a view of one of the more dynamic and complexly-formed star-forming areas in space. It can be found 210,000 light-years from Earth in the Small Magellanic Cloud. A satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, it’s located in this image
One striking example of a bipolar planetary nebula is the PN M2-9 Twin Jet Nebula. The formation of bipolar planetary Nebulae occurs when the central object, which isn’t a single star but rather a binary systems, takes place.
Nebulae are vast interstellar clouds of dust and gas where star formation can take place and at the centre of NGC 2014 is a clutch of bright stars, each 10 to 20 times more massive than our Sun.
Astronomers believed the nebulae looked like an underwater world. They gave the portrait the name ‘cosmic coral’.
Hubble also captured a famous image of the Ursa Major constellation, which showed a small patch of the sky that revealed approximately 3,000 galaxies. This gave Hubble a peek into the past.
It was thought that light from distant objects would spread out too much to make them appear faint against the blackness. However, the Hubble Deep field, which was observed for 10 consecutive days in December 1995 proved otherwise.
Galaxies are being discovered by astronomers from 500 million years ago. This allows them to track galaxy evolution and measure how their properties change with time.
2004’s Hubble Ultra Deep field was the best ever portrait of the visible Universe by humans. It viewed nearly 10,000 galaxies.
Hubble took this portrait of Stephan’s Quintet in 2009, also called the Hickson Compact Group 92. Stephan’s Quintet is made up of five galaxies, but its name may be a little misleading. Study have revealed that NGC 7320 (pictured at the top left) is actually the foreground galaxy of this group. It is seven times closer than Earth to the rest.
Hubble has captured the star V838 monocerotis (V838Mon) a few times, but in 2005 this Hubble image revealed striking changes in how dusty clouds are illuminated.
In 2011, Hubble became the first Earth-based telescope to snap an image of the aurorae on Uranus. This is a composite image of Uranus by Voyager 2 and two different observations made by Hubble — one for the ring and one for the aurorae
‘Mystic Mountain’: This craggy fantasy mountaintop enshrouded by wispy clouds looks like a bizarre landscape from Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The Carina Nebula is a tempestuous star nursery that it lies in. It was made public to commemorate the 20th anniversary Hubble’s launch.
Hubble captured in 2002 a star-shaped galaxy that was engaged in a celestial dance between cat and mouse. The colliding galaxies are located 300 million light years away under the constellation Coma Berenices. Their long tails of gas and stars emanating from their respective galaxy have earned them the nickname “The Mice”. These galaxies will merge eventually to form a single one.
Hubble’s photograph of Westerlund 2 (pictured) and its surrounding was released by Hubble to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Hubble’s space telescope being in orbit. This image celebrates a quarter-century of amazing discoveries, incredible images, and remarkable science.
“Rings of Relativity”: This image depicts GAL-CLUS-012058s located in Fornax, a southern hemisphere constellation (The Furnace). GAL-CLUS-22058s is one of the longest and most comprehensive Einstein rings that have been discovered. It is also known by the nickname “Molten Ring” (as it was referred to by astronomers).
The ‘Horsehead Nebula’: This picture showing part of the sky in the constellation of Orion (The Hunter) was released to mark Hubble’s 23rd anniversary in 2013. Horsehead Nebula is a huge seahorse rising from the turbulent waves of gas and dust.
The Hubble Ultra Deep Field is a view of almost 10,000 galaxies that cuts across billions light-years. It’s also known as the Hubble Ultra Deep Field.
One year later, the telescope captured two unknown moons orbiting Pluto. In 2007, it also helped to produce a 3D map showing how dark matter is distributed in the universe.
Thirteen years ago it also took the first visual image of an exoplanet when it captured Formalhaut b.
Other discoveries have included never-before-seen evidence of a collision between two asteroids and a spectroscopic analysis of the exoplanet HAT-P-7b to mark its millionth observation.
TABLE ONE: 2015The effect of gravitational lensesing on distant stars was observed by the space telescope for the first-time.
The powerful gravity from a distant galaxy serves as a magnifying mirror, magnifying and splitting the image to create a cross-shaped pattern.
Hubble, affectionately known by the name “our eye in the Universe”, was Hubble. Space shuttle Discovery was launched via Kennedy Space Centre, Florida on April 24, 1990.
This was the greatest advancement in astronomy after Galileo’s telescope. It was also named Edwin Hubble (born in Missouri, 1889).
Hubble cost $4.7 billion (£3.4 billion) to build and has a 7ft 10in mirror which can observe in ultraviolet, visible and near-infrared.
Our planet is circled by the telescope at a speed around 17,000mph (227,300kph). It orbits low at 340 miles altitude at approximately 340 miles. This pace is slightly faster than that of the International Space Station (ISS).
Hubble’s primary mirror is 2.4 meters (7 feet, 10.5 inches) across and in total is 13.3 meters (43.5 feet) long — the length of a large school bus.
The mirror, however, was not the focus of any of the five spacecraft servicing missions.
It was December 1993 that Commander Richard Covey, his crew and others installed equipment to repair a vision problem caused due to a misshaped reflection.
This caused the telescope to lose focus on all of the light coming from the object, creating a blurred halo.
The future mission saw the addition of infrared-sensitive cameras to permit astronomers greater distances to distant galaxies.
Some missions had the purpose of repairing issues aboard, such as three failed gyroscopes in 1999 or when solar panels required to be aligned.
In 2009, the last Hubble mission to Atlantis was completed. It was described as the “most difficult and intensive servicing mission”.
Five spacewalks were required to place two instruments, including the Wide Field Camera. This made it 100x more powerful than it was when it launched.
A similar problem was found with the command systems for the science instruments.
The telescope was equipped with a brand new system and additional backups.
At the start of December, Hubble finally returned to full operations after more than a month of communications issues caused by its latest big outage.
NASA said the ageing telescope was now operating with all four active instruments collecting science data for the first time since the end of October.
Hubble was affected by a bug that made some functions of the telescope not work properly.
NASA announced that NASA had placed the instrument in a “safe mode” following synchronization issues.
While the Hubble may be set to safe mode and not receive any data from celestial objects, it can still power up.
Hubble took the most amazing image ever of the Antennae Galaxies in 2013 The Hubble had seen them before in NGC 4038 and 2006. Each one is better due to improvements made by servicing missions. The galaxies — also known as NGC 4038 and NGC 4039 — are locked in a deadly embrace
This Hubble image shows NGC 3603, the star-forming area, which contains one of most spectacular and massive star clusters within the Milky Way. Hot blue stars in the center of NGC 3603 are responsible for creating a large cavity in the gas.
The stunning picture shows NGC 1015 the magnificent galaxy, located 118 million miles from Earth in the constellation of Cetus. The scene of NGC 1015 is reminiscent of a sparkly Catherine wheel firework, with its bright central bulge and symmetrically swirling arms.
The tiny, delicate butterfly wings that look so pretty are really roiling gas cauldrons heated to almost 20,000 Celsius. The gas is tearing across space at more than 590,000 miles per hour — fast enough to travel from Earth to the moon in 24 minutes
In a December 2012 photo, an orange glow emanates from NGC 1792’s centre, which is the heart of the stellar forge. NGC 1792, a galaxy that is both spiral and starburst, can be found in constellation Columba.
‘Magnetic monster’: This stunning image of the bright galaxy NGC 1275 was taken in 2006. It provides amazing detail and resolution of the fragile filamentary structures, which are cool despite being surrounded by gas that is around 55 million degrees Celsius hot
This stunning galaxy NGC 2525 can be found nearly 70,000,000 light-years away from Earth. It is part the constellation Puppis, which lies in the southern half of the hemisphere. This constellation, along with the Vela and Carina constellations makes it an image of Argo from the ancient Greek mythology. At the center of NGC 2525 lies another monster: a supermassive, black hole.
NASA dismissed fears of Hubble’s impending shutdown earlier in the year due to a computer problem.
Hubble circled our planet at an estimated 17,000mph (7,300kph). This is low-Earth orbit at approximately 340m in altitude. Its speed is slightly slower than the International Space Station.
Unfortunately for NASA, this wasn’t the first time Hubble has suffered issues in 2021 — in June it stopped working after it ran into problems with a 1980s-era computer that controls its science instruments.
On July 17, the telescope’s science operations were resumed.
Hubble marked its 31st birthday in space recently with an image featuring a large star at the edge of death.
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, valued at $10 billion by NASA, is a major upgrade of the Hubble telescope. It is also 100 times stronger.
NASA prefers to see James Webb more as an extension of Hubble than as a replacement. They know that they will be working together for some time.
The changing of the guard is an exciting time for astronomy, but despite being one of the grand scientific endeavours of the 21st Century, with a mission is to image the very first stars to shine in the universe, James Webb will never taken away how Hubble changed our view of the universe and our place within it.
NASAs Hubble Space Telescope, still in operation and having made 1.5 Million observations since 1990 when it began its mission
On April 24, 1990 the Hubble telescope was launched via Discovery, a spaceship from Kennedy Space Centre in Florida.
Named after Edwin Hubble (1889-1889), the astronomer is a well-known figure in the sky.
Perhaps his most notable discovery, the Hubble constant, is that the universe expands at a faster rate than it does now is what he is best known for.
The Hubble telescope is named after famed astronomer Edwin Hubble who was born in Missouri in 1889 (pictured)
Hubble made over 1.5 million observations and published some 18,000 papers since 1990, when its mission started.
It orbits the Earth at 17,000mph (12.7300kph). The Earth orbit is about 340 miles high.
Hubble’s pointing accuracy is.007 arc second, or the equivalent of being able shine a beam of laser light on Franklin D. Roosevelt from a distance 200 miles (2320km).
Edwin Hubble is the reason why the Hubble telescope was named for him. He is one the best astronomers ever.
Hubble’s primary mirror is 2.4 meters (7 feet, 10.5 inches) across and in total is 13.3 meters (43.5 feet) long – the length of a large school bus.
Hubble’s April 1990 launch and deployment marked the greatest advancement in astronomy after Galileo’s telescope.
Thanks to 5 servicing missions and over 25 years of operation our vision of the universe has never changed.