History of Hubble Space Telescope (HST)

This new image taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is of the nearby dwarf galaxy NGC 1569. This galaxy is a hotbed of vigorous star birth activity which blows huge bubbles that riddle its main body. The bubble structure is sculpted by the galactic super-winds and outflows caused by a colossal input of energy from collective supernova explosions that are linked with a massive episode of star birth. The bubbles seen in this image are made of hydrogen gas that glows when hit by the fierce wind and radiation from hot young stars and is racked by supernova shocks. Its "star factories" are also manufacturing brilliant blue star clusters. NGC 1569 had a sudden onset of star birth about 25 million years ago, which subsided about the time the very earliest human ancestors appeared on Earth. The Marshall Space Flight Center had responsibility for the design, development, and construction of the HST.