2003

• 12/4/2003 STScI-2003-30 1. Firestorm of Star Birth Seen in a Local Galaxy This festively colorful nebula, called NGC 604, is one of the largest known seething cauldrons of star birth seen in a nearby galaxy. NGC 604 is similar... (More)
• 11/20/2003 STScI-2003-34 2. Vote for your Favorite Hubble Wide Field/Planetary Camera 2 Picture To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) onboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, you're invited... (More)
• 11/7/2003 STScI-2003-33 3. Thompson and NICMOS Team Win Muhlmann Award The Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) has awarded its 2003 Maria and Eric Muhlmann Award to Professor Rodger I. Thompson (University of Arizona)... (More)
• 11/6/2003 STScI-2003-31 4. Hubble Photographs Turbulent Neighborhood Near Eruptive Star Dramatic dark dust knots and complex structures are sculpted by the high-velocity stellar winds and high-energy radiation from the ultra-luminous variable... (More)
• 10/30/2003 STScI-2003-32 5. Megastar-Birth Cluster is Biggest, Brightest and Hottest Ever Seen A mysterious arc of light found behind a distant cluster of galaxies has turned out to be the biggest, brightest, and hottest star-forming... (More)
• 10/2/2003 STScI-2003-28 6. Heritage Project Celebrates Five Years of Harvesting the Best Images from Hubble Space Telescope The Hubble Heritage team of astronomers, who assemble many of the NASA Hubble Space Telescope's most stunning pictures... (More)
• 9/25/2003 STScI-2003-29 7. Hubble Uncovers Smallest Moons Yet Seen Around Uranus Astronomers have discovered two of the smallest moons yet found around Uranus. The new moons, uncovered by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope... (More)
• 9/10/2003 STScI-2003-27 8. NASA Approves James Webb Space Telescope Mirror Architecture NASA today announced a major milestone in the development of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the selection of a beryllium-based mirror technology for the telescope's... (More)
• 9/9/2003 STScI-2003-23 9. The Slant on Saturn's Rings This is a series of images of Saturn, as seen at many different wavelengths, when the planet's rings were at their maximum tilt of 27 degrees toward Earth. Saturn experiences seasonal... (More)
• 9/6/2003 STScI-2003-25 10. Farthest, Faintest Solar System Objects Found Beyond Neptune Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have discovered three of the faintest and smallest objects ever detected beyond Neptune. (More)
• 9/5/2003 STScI-2003-26 11. Hubble Assists Rosetta Comet Mission Results from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope played a major role in preparing ESA's ambitious Rosetta mission for its new target, comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P/C-G). (More)
• 9/4/2003 STScI-2003-24 12. Celestial Composition Amid a backdrop of far-off galaxies, the majestic dusty spiral NGC 3370 looms in the foreground in this NASA Hubble Space Telescope image. Recent observations taken with the Advanced... (More)
• 8/27/2003 STScI-2003-22 13. Mars: Closest Encounter These two images, taken 11 hours apart with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, reveal two nearly opposite sides of Mars. Hubble snapped these photos as the red planet was making its closest approach... (More)
• 8/7/2003 STScI-2003-21 14. Too Close for Comfort This Hubble Space Telescope view of the core of one of the nearest globular star clusters, called NGC 6397, resembles a treasure chest of glittering jewels. The cluster is located 8,200 light-years... (More)
• 7/10/2003 STScI-2003-19 15. Oldest Known Planet Identified NASA's Hubble Space Telescope precisely measured the mass of the oldest known planet in our Milky Way galaxy. At an estimated age of 13 billion years, the... (More)
• 7/3/2003 STScI-2003-20 16. Celestial Fireworks Resembling the puffs of smoke and sparks from a summer fireworks display in this image from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, these delicate filaments are actually sheets of debris from a stellar... (More)
• 6/19/2003 STScI-2003-18 17. The Secret Lives of Galaxies Unveiled in Deep Survey Two of NASA's Great Observatories, bolstered by the largest ground-based telescopes around the world, are beginning to harvest... (More)
• 6/5/2003 STScI-2003-16 18. Supernova Shock Wave Paints Cosmic Portrait Remnants from a star that exploded thousands of years ago created a celestial abstract portrait, as captured in this NASA Hubble Space Telescope image of the Pencil Nebula. Officially... (More)
• 5/15/2003 STScI-2003-17 19. Brighter Neptune Suggests a Planetary Change of Seasons Springtime is blooming on Neptune! This might sound like an oxymoron because Neptune is the farthest and coldest of the major planets. But observations... (More)
• 5/9/2003 STScI-2003-11 20. Iridescent Glory of Nearby Planetary Nebula Showcased on Astronomy Day This photograph of the coil-shaped Helix Nebula is one of the largest and most detailed celestial images ever made. The composite picture is a seamless... (More)
• 5/7/2003 STScI-2003-15 21. Deepest View of Space Yields Young Stars in Andromeda Halo Relying on the deepest visible-light images ever taken in space, astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope (HST) have reliably measured... (More)
• 5/1/2003 STScI-2003-14 22. Freewheeling Galaxies Collide in a Blaze of Star Birth A dusty spiral galaxy appears to be rotating on edge, like a pinwheel, as it slides through the larger, bright galaxy NGC 1275, in this NASA Hubble Space Telescope... (More)
• 4/24/2003 STScI-2003-13 23. Hubble Captures a Perfect Storm of Turbulent Gases Resembling the fury of a raging sea, this image actually shows a bubbly ocean of glowing hydrogen gas and small amounts of other elements such as oxygen and sulfur. (More)
• 4/10/2003 STScI-2003-12 24. Far-Flung Supernovae Shed Light on Dark Universe New Hubble Space Telescope observations of a pair of very distant exploding stars, called Type Ia supernovae, provide new clues about the accelerating universe and its mysterious... (More)
• 4/3/2003 STScI-2003-09 25. Rainbow Image of a Dusty Star Resembling a rippling pool illuminated by underwater lights, the Egg Nebula offers astronomers a special look at the normally invisible dust shells swaddling an aging star. (More)
• 3/26/2003 STScI-2003-10 26. Hubble Watches Light from Mysterious Erupting Star Reverberate Through Space In January 2002, a dull star in an obscure constellation suddenly became 600,000 times more luminous than our Sun, temporarily making it the brightest... (More)
• 3/12/2003 STScI-2003-08 27. Too Close for Comfort: Hubble Discovers an Evaporating Planet Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have observed for the first time the atmosphere of a planet beyond our solar system evaporating into space. (More)
• 3/6/2003 STScI-2003-07 28. Hubble Resolves a Blaze of Stars in a Galaxy's Core The central region of the small galaxy NGC 1705 blazes with the light of thousands of young and old stars in... (More)
• 2/10/2003 STScI-2003-06 29. Close-up of M27, the Dumbbell Nebula An aging star's last hurrah is creating a flurry of glowing knots of gas that appear to be streaking through space in this close-up image of the Dumbbell Nebula... (More)
• 1/9/2003 STScI-2003-05 30. Scientists Find Faint Objects with Hubble that May Have Ended the Universe's 'Dark Ages' Researchers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope believe they are seeing the conclusion... (More)
• 1/9/2003 STScI-2003-03 31. Hubble Probes the Heart of a Nearby Quasar The Hubble Space Telescope's new Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) has provided the clearest view yet in visible light of the nearby quasar, 3C 273 [image at right]. (More)
• 1/8/2003 STScI-2003-04 32. Giant Radio Jet Coming from Wrong Kind of Galaxy These are composite images of the galaxy 0313-192, the first spiral galaxy known to be producing a giant radio-emitting jet. The image at left represents... (More)
• 1/7/2003 STScI-2003-01 33. Biggest 'Zoom Lens' in Space Takes Hubble Deeper into the Universe The Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has used a natural "zoom lens" in space to boost its view of the distant... (More)
• 1/6/2003 STScI-2003-02 34. Hubble Reveals Complex Circumstellar Disk NASA Hubble Space Telescope's new Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) has given astronomers their clearest view yet of the dust disk around a young, 5-million-year-old star. (More)