1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:07,000 For the first time since astronauts visited it in May, Hubble is opening its upgraded eyes. 2 00:00:07,000 --> 00:00:14,000 Brand new and repaired instruments have facilitated a spectacular reveal of the observatory’s new capabilities. 3 00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:20,000 The moment many have been waiting for has arrived; Hubble is back and better than ever. 4 00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:40,000 This is the Hubblecast! 5 00:00:40,000 --> 00:00:43,000 News and images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. 6 00:00:43,000 --> 00:00:49,000 Travelling through time and space with your host, Dr. J, aka Dr. Joe Liske. 7 00:00:49,000 --> 00:00:52,000 Hello and welcome back to the Hubblecast. 8 00:00:52,000 --> 00:00:57,000 As I’m sure some of you have noticed, we haven’t seen any new images coming from our favourite telescope lately. 9 00:00:57,000 --> 00:01:00,000 That’s of course because in May 2009, 10 00:01:00,000 --> 00:01:06,000 7 daring astronauts spent 30 spacewalking hours repairing Hubble and replacing some of its instruments. 11 00:01:06,000 --> 00:01:11,000 Now Hubble is of course unique in that it’s the only space telescope that can be serviced by humans 12 00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:15,000 and the astronauts really made the most of their last visit. 13 00:01:15,000 --> 00:01:19,000 Now, the fruits of their labour are finaly ready for everyone to see. 14 00:01:19,000 --> 00:01:23,000 In this episode, we’re going to show you Hubble’s first observations after the servicing mission. 15 00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:27,000 The new images show us a bunch of different astrophysical phenomena, 16 00:01:27,000 --> 00:01:34,000 ranging from a bug-like planetary nebula to one of these huge galaxy clusters that act like a cosmic magnifying glass. 17 00:01:36,000 --> 00:01:38,000 When new instruments are brought from Earth to Hubble, 18 00:01:38,000 --> 00:01:44,000 they need a chance to eliminate any trapped gases that could cause interference with their performance. 19 00:01:44,000 --> 00:01:47,000 This is a process called outgassing. 20 00:01:47,000 --> 00:01:49,000 Once that procedure is complete, 21 00:01:49,000 --> 00:01:56,000 scientists work with engineers to ensure that instruments are properly calibrated, so the quality of the data is top-notch. 22 00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:00,000 After an incredible 16 years of service, the much-celebrated WFPC2, 23 00:02:00,000 --> 00:02:05,000 or Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 has now finally been retired. 24 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:09,000 Instead, we now have WFC3, the Wide Field Camera 3. 25 00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:15,000 This new camera has imaged a stellar jet about 7,500 light-years away in the Carina Nebula. 26 00:02:15,000 --> 00:02:22,000 What is going on here is that we have an infant star about 8 times as massive as the Sun which is causing quite a stir. 27 00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:25,000 What the WFC3 image reveals is a pillar of gas 28 00:02:25,000 --> 00:02:29,000 and it’s at the centre of this gas cloud that the young star is forming. 29 00:02:29,000 --> 00:02:32,000 Now the star is surrounded by swirling gas and dust 30 00:02:32,000 --> 00:02:35,000 and some of this material is being pulled into the star by its gravity. 31 00:02:35,000 --> 00:02:38,000 As a result of this tumultuous process, 32 00:02:38,000 --> 00:02:42,000 a jet is formed and the interaction of this jet causes shockwaves 33 00:02:42,000 --> 00:02:46,000 and intense heat which ionises the surrounding gas, thus causing it to glow. 34 00:02:49,000 --> 00:02:52,000 Truly the most powerful camera ever sent into space, 35 00:02:52,000 --> 00:02:58,000 the new WFC3’s capabilities in both the visible and the infrared are an unbeatable combination 36 00:02:58,000 --> 00:03:04,000 and complements Hubble’s other instruments, especially the Advanced Camera for Surveys. 37 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:08,000 Moving from visible to infrared in the image of the Carina Nebula, 38 00:03:08,000 --> 00:03:13,000 we see the nebulosity fade and the baby star and its emission jets are revealed. 39 00:03:13,000 --> 00:03:22,000 WFC3’s impressive infrared capability reveals hundreds of stars and the jet itself hidden behind the dust and gas. 40 00:03:24,000 --> 00:03:28,000 Stephan’s Quintet is a stunning collection of five galaxies. 41 00:03:30,000 --> 00:03:33,000 Four of these galaxies’ destinies are literally bound together. 42 00:03:33,000 --> 00:03:36,000 As they crash into each other at break-neck speed, 43 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:40,000 gas is ripped from the galaxies and produces the distinctive tidal tails. 44 00:03:40,000 --> 00:03:43,000 Now astronomers believe that galaxy mergers like we see here 45 00:03:43,000 --> 00:03:47,000 are one of the key processes by which galaxies can grow and evolve 46 00:03:47,000 --> 00:03:53,000 and so studying mergers can help us understand what shapes many of the galaxies that we see around us today. 47 00:03:54,000 --> 00:03:59,000 The new WFC3 camera’s detector is highly sensitive and, 48 00:03:59,000 --> 00:04:06,000 paired with the camera’s wide field of view, it improves Hubble’s discovery power by 20 to 35 times! 49 00:04:09,000 --> 00:04:18,000 The wide field of view and clear resolution of WFC3 will enable forensic searches that lead to clues about the collisions and mergers between galaxies, 50 00:04:18,000 --> 00:04:22,000 as seen in the beautiful swirling chaos of Stephan’s Quintet. 51 00:04:26,000 --> 00:04:30,000 WFC3 has also zoomed in on one very hot cosmic bug. 52 00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:37,000 NGC 6302 is a planetary nebula that is better known as the Bug Nebula or the Butterfly Nebula. 53 00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:39,000 And it is pretty easy to see why: 54 00:04:42,000 --> 00:04:47,000 The source of the nebula is an extremely hot dying star which was once about 5 times the mass of the Sun. 55 00:04:47,000 --> 00:04:54,000 It has now evolved into a red giant and its life will soon come to an end but it’s not going quietly. 56 00:04:55,000 --> 00:05:01,000 The improvement in resolution provided by WFC3 is clear but this new image reveals so much more. 57 00:05:01,000 --> 00:05:07,000 WFC3 is equipped with a wide variety of filters that isolate light emitted by various chemical elements, 58 00:05:07,000 --> 00:05:11,000 allowing astronomers to infer properties of the nebular gas, 59 00:05:11,000 --> 00:05:14,000 such as its temperature, density, and composition. 60 00:05:14,000 --> 00:05:19,000 The reddish outer edges of the nebula are due to light emitted by nitrogen, 61 00:05:19,000 --> 00:05:22,000 which marks the coolest gas visible in the picture. 62 00:05:22,000 --> 00:05:27,000 The white areas emanating from the hidden central star are sulfur-emitting regions 63 00:05:27,000 --> 00:05:31,000 where fast- and slow-moving gases collide and cause shockwaves. 64 00:05:31,000 --> 00:05:37,000 The image also shows numerous finger-like projections pointing back to the star, 65 00:05:37,000 --> 00:05:41,000 which may mark denser blobs in the outflow that have resisted the pressure from the star. 66 00:05:42,000 --> 00:05:49,000 Hubble’s newly-repaired Advanced Camera for Surveys has eyed a fascinating galaxy cluster called Abell 370. 67 00:05:49,000 --> 00:05:55,000 This is one of the places in the Universe where Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity really comes to life. 68 00:05:57,000 --> 00:06:00,000 The image captures the phenomenon of gravitational lensing. 69 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:05,000 If you have a galaxy that sits behind a really massive object like a galaxy cluster, 70 00:06:05,000 --> 00:06:13,000 then the light from that background galaxy gets bent by the gravitational pull of the foreground cluster as the light passes the cluster. 71 00:06:13,000 --> 00:06:18,000 Now this process can seriously distort the image of the background galaxy, often making it look like an arc. 72 00:06:18,000 --> 00:06:24,000 It also magnifies the image of the galaxy and so the cluster acts sort of like a cosmic magnifying glass. 73 00:06:27,000 --> 00:06:34,000 Although Abell 370 has been imaged by other telescopes, this Hubble ACS image is the most detailed yet. 74 00:06:34,000 --> 00:06:43,000 In the large, striking orangeish arc, the curvature of the arc abruptly changes to turn around the smaller galaxies as the light is warped by their gravity. 75 00:06:43,000 --> 00:06:47,000 This prominent arc seems to appear several times in the image 76 00:06:47,000 --> 00:06:50,000 as if copied and pasted onto other parts of the sky. 77 00:06:52,000 --> 00:06:59,000 Another incredible example of the level of detail is in the arm of a spiral galaxy at the bottom right in the image. 78 00:06:59,000 --> 00:07:03,000 The arm is strongly bent, or distorted by a foreground galaxy. 79 00:07:06,000 --> 00:07:08,000 The new Cosmic Origin Spectrograph, COS, 80 00:07:08,000 --> 00:07:11,000 and the repaired Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, STIS, 81 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:15,000 are providing us with taking capability of taking spectra in ultraviolet light. 82 00:07:15,000 --> 00:07:19,000 Now astronomers have pointed these instruments towards Eta Carina 83 00:07:19,000 --> 00:07:23,000 which is a rather large and unstable binary system. 84 00:07:23,000 --> 00:07:27,000 Now this pair of stars has a tendency towards violent outbursts 85 00:07:27,000 --> 00:07:35,000 and astronomers have used COS and STIS to identify some of the elements in the material that is forcefully being ejected by this duo. 86 00:07:39,000 --> 00:07:44,000 Hubble also captured the aftermath of the death of a massive star in the Large Magellanic Cloud, 87 00:07:44,000 --> 00:07:47,000 an irregular galaxy close to our own Milky Way. 88 00:07:47,000 --> 00:07:50,000 The object, known as N132D, lies roughly 170,000 light-years away 89 00:07:50,000 --> 00:08:00,000 and provides an exceptional opportunity for forensic analysis of the life and demise of a massive star. 90 00:08:00,000 --> 00:08:06,000 In addition to the stunning visual image that highlights a cloud of pink emission gas and soft purple wisps, 91 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:12,000 the COS instrument gives astronomers clues to the chemical processes deep inside the star. 92 00:08:14,000 --> 00:08:21,000 Another object spied by two of Hubble’s new and repaired instruments is the barred spiral galaxy, Markarian 817. 93 00:08:21,000 --> 00:08:24,000 Now this galaxy has a very bright nucleus 94 00:08:24,000 --> 00:08:27,000 and that’s because it harbours a supermassive black hole right at its center 95 00:08:27,000 --> 00:08:30,000 which is being fuelled with the gas from the galaxy. 96 00:08:30,000 --> 00:08:34,000 This is called an active galactic nucleus, or AGN. 97 00:08:34,000 --> 00:08:39,000 In many other galaxies, the AGN can be so bright that it outshines the whole rest of the galaxy. 98 00:08:42,000 --> 00:08:45,000 Looking like a brightly-decorated Christmas tree, 99 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:50,000 this image is actually a small part of the huge globular cluster called Omega Centauri. 100 00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:59,000 Although held together by gravity, the stars in this cluster are at different stages of life and thanks to WFC3’s sensitivity, 101 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:07,000 we are treated to a twinkling array from yellow-white “mid-life” stars like our own Sun to retiring red giants. 102 00:09:07,000 --> 00:09:13,000 Although the stars are close together, WFC3’s sharpness can resolve each of them as individual stars. 103 00:09:17,000 --> 00:09:22,000 Hubble is well into its 19th year of observations but it continues to keep a watchful eye on the Universe. 104 00:09:22,000 --> 00:09:27,000 Although Hubble may be middle-aged by spacecraft standards, it is definitely not slowing down. 105 00:09:27,000 --> 00:09:31,000 Equipped with a powerful set of new and repaired instruments, 106 00:09:31,000 --> 00:09:35,000 this scientific icon is continuing its quest to unravel the secrets of the cosmos, 107 00:09:35,000 --> 00:09:40,000 to link us to our distant past and to give us a reason for another episode! 108 00:09:40,000 --> 00:09:43,000 This is Dr. J signing off for the Hubblecast. 109 00:09:43,000 --> 00:09:47,000 Once again, nature has surprised us beyond our wildest imagination.