Washington, Dec 8, 2008 : .According to NASA, the Hubble Space Telescope is now fully operational with all four active instruments collecting science data. Monday’s recovery of the Space Telescope Imaging Scope by NASA and the European Space Agency, Hubble teams was a joint mission.According to a statement from the US space agency, the team has not detected any additional synchronisation messages since November 1, when monitoring began.
The Hubble Space Telescope’s science instruments issued unexpected error codes on October 23.These codes indicated that there was a loss of a specific syncronisation message.NASA continued to investigate the matter and on October 25, science instruments were put into safe mode.
After overcoming the glitch, the Hubble team recovered the Advanced Camera for Surveys instrument in November and began science observations again.
NASA stated that the team would continue to work on improving instrument software to allow them to perform science operations even if they face lost synchronisation messages.
The Cosmic Origins Spectrum Spectrograph will see the first of these changes in mid-December.
It also stated that similar updates will be made to the other instruments in the coming months.
Hubble has been in operation for more than 31 years now, collecting ground-breaking science observations which have revolutionized our understanding of the universe.
The telescope was launched in 1990 and has made some of the most important discoveries about our cosmos.These include the acceleration of the universe, the evolution over time of galaxies, and the first atmospheric studies on planets outside our solar system.
It was established with the mission of probing the farthest and most obscure reaches of the cosmos for at least 15 years.This goal is still being met.
Hubble will soon join the James Webb Space Telescope in space, a collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency.
NASA stated that NASA expects the two observatories to work well together into the next decade, with the launch of the Webb Telescope scheduled for later in the month.
This will allow NASA to expand our knowledge of the cosmos further.
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