Wednesday 7 January 2015

When Ever I Hear About The Hubble Space Telescope,

I always think of this iconic picture, 


 the Pillars of Creation, as it is known, the original photograph was taken by Hubble Space Telescope in 1995, the photo depicts tall columns (called elephant trunks) of interstellar dust and gas within the Eagle Nebula about 6,500 light years from Earth, for the first time in 20 years, NASA revisited the Pillars of Creation using a new camera installed on Hubble back in 2009 capable of much higher resolutions, the new photo, including an infrared version, was published yesterday, this is it above, from the NASA press release about the new image,

'now Hubble has revisited the famous pillars, capturing the multi-coloured glow of gas clouds, wispy tendrils of dark cosmic dust, and the rust-coloured elephants’ trunks with the newer Wide Field Camera 3, installed in 2009, the visible-light image builds on one of the most iconic astronomy images ever taken and provides astronomers with an even sharper and wider view',

 just out of interest this is the 'old' and 'new' picture of the Pillars of Creation as a comparison,

the same new picture taken showing the infra red image, you can see the new photo in even higher detail by downloading images at several resolutions on this page, NASA with the Hubble has revisited this icon, I wonder what new wonders it will find?


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