The First Picture From Hubble Was Heart-Breaking!

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The Hubble Space Telescope is a marvel of engineering that changed the course of astronomy. The 4.7-billion-dollar telescope was launched in April 1990. After it was launched more than three decades ago, there was great excitement about its first picture. But when Hubble took its first shot, it was a huge embarrassment. There seemed to be some significant flaw, which made all the images fuzzy.

But what was the flaw exactly, and how did NASA fix the space telescope?

The problem was with the null corrector, a scientific instrument used in testing large mirrors. This instrument generates some kind of "contour map," and it is called a null corrector because if the mirrors are perfect, the numerical result of the test will be null. Unfortunately, some NASA tests concluded that this null corrector was a few millimeters askew, and that small mistake led to errors in the tests.

The error that the flawed mirror introduced is known as spherical aberration. In a perfect telescope mirror, light from a distant object gets focused on one point. But if the mirror is flawed, the telescope is rendered fundamentally unfocussed. All the five instruments aboard the telescope relied on the light from this mirror. As a result, none of them could work perfectly. The solution, at heart, was straightforward. First, they thought about replacing the mirror, as Kodak had a backup mirror on the ground. But that would have been very expensive and hard to do. So, they came up with this: if the mirror is wrong-shaped somewhere, why don't we make a package of corrective optics with the exact same error but with an inverse effect. That would cancel the error in the first place.

There were five servicing missions for Hubble, the first one in 1993 and the last one in 2009. The one that fixed this problem was the first servicing mission, the one from 1993, STS-61. The mission comprised seven well-prepared astronauts and lasted 11 days. It established many records for NASA, including the fact that it was one of the most complex missions ever.

After the mission, the team of Hubble took pictures of stars and galaxies, and everything seemed to work perfectly. Looking at the pictures, they knew that the problem was solved, and everything that Hubble was supposed to do was now going to happen. After more than three decades, Hubble continues to be astronomers' best friend in space. The telescope has really changed the way we look at the cosmos.

#hubble #space #nasa #telescope

Created By: Rishabh Nakra
Written By: Simran Buttar and Bogdan Teodorescu
Narrated By: Jeffrey Smith
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Your videos are beyond amazing. I thought I knew a bunch of what there's to know about space, but I've learned much more from you!

dyplayzroblox
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All it takes is one video to make me watch all your videos all over again, even thou I watched them already 👍🏻👊🏻👊🏻👊🏻

stonedwarriorxx
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I was expecting maybe an alien taking a dump. That would’ve been embarrassing.

WrathofArminius
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It was disastrous mess, but they did fix it and we all benefited, great vid thx🖒.. cA

crazya
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Thanks for sharing such magnificent content with us. I appreciate your hard work and the time you invest in it. Thanks a ton.!

The_Tormented_One
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H - Having
A - Anger
T - Towards
E - Everyone
R - Reaching
S - Success

warrior_of_coc
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Has the Hubble computer problem been solved?

Starshine_Swastika
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Hubble is now just as including galaxies, planets and stars.

andrefarfan
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Let's pray, James webb doesn't get this.

JfdSummer
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That machine is a sacrifice of 14 people. Who died in space shuttle disaster.

Banga
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The problem is they trusted a computer to test the mirror which did not show an error in the mirror. The back up mirror was tested manually using a test that has been used for at least 100 years and thousands of amateures have used to make their own mirrors

stevenelmore
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Does voyager 1 and 2 are in connection
Or not

yashodasati
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guys i was looking at night and saw a bunch of starlings fly its so cool

neptune
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Sir there is a news James webb telescope is ready can you please make a video

shankarbhandari
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Hey please upload the video for "ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS IN THE MONTH OF AUGUST 2021"
We all are waiting

kaiparkar
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Little tiny fault that lead gigantic solar flare problems

nenijuni
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Just because Americans were not used to using the metric system.

merakrut
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Does anyone remember when NASA said the HUBBLE is falling, then nothing.Nasa does not know how it got to the most northern part of the moon.Hey NASA tell the truth.

patrickwalsh
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wee grasshopper when you can walk on rice paper and not break wind you will be a man...Kung Fu....oriental wise man..

jaykidd
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'Cosmos' as in 'loss' not as in English please, we'd appreciate it over here

finregan