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Spectacular new pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope have been released, marking 25 years since it was launched into orbit by the Space Shuttle.
On April 24, 1990, the shuttle carried Hubble up into space, making it the first telescope of its kind. And today the European Space Agency released a new image marking 25 years since it was launched.
The picture shows what the agency refers to as "silver anniversary fireworks", which are spewing out of a star cluster known as Westerlund 2 and made up of about 3,000 stars.
Astronomers took the picture by combining Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys, which looks at visible light, and the Wide Field Camera 3 which can see near-infrared. The image would not normally have been able to see because it is surrounded by dust, but the technology on the telescope allows astronomers to look through it.
25 years of the Hubble TelescopeShow all 26 1 /2625 years of the Hubble Telescope 25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope A Hubble image of a pillar of gas and dust that is being eaten away by the light from nearby stars in the Carina nebula, located 7,500 light years away
AP
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The sharpest view of the Orion Nebula from the Hubble Space Telescope, 2004–05
© NASA/ESA/M. Robberto (Space Telescope Science Institute/ESA) and the Hubble Space Telescope Orion Treasury Project Team
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope This picture taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope shows six-light-year-wide expanding remnant of a star's supernova explosion, released in 2005
Getty Images
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The star HD 184738, also known as Campbell’s hydrogen star, surrounded by plumes of reddish gas — the fiery red and orange hues are caused by glowing gases, including hydrogen and nitrogen
ESA/Hubble & NASA
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The tip of the three-light-year-long pillar in a stellar nursery called the Carina Nebula, located 7500 light-years away from the Earth
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The Carina Nebula. Outflowing winds and intense ultraviolet radiation from the large stars shape the material that is the last vestige of the giant cloud from which the stars were born
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope This Hubble image of the Antennae galaxies is the sharpest yet of this merging pair of galaxies. As the two galaxies smash together, billions of stars are born, mostly in groups and clusters of stars. The brightest and most compact of these are called super star clusters.
NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Image of the Butterfly Nebula, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope A nebula named Knockout 4-55 (or K 4-55) photographed by Hubble in 2009
Getty
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The barred spiral galaxy M83, also known as the Southern Pinwheel. The Hubble photograph captures thousands of star clusters, hundreds of thousands of individual stars, and 'ghosts' of dead stars called supernova remnants
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Kepler's supernova remnant produced by combining data from NASA's three Great Observatories the Hubble Space Telescope, the Spitzer Space Telescope, and the Chandra X-ray Observatory
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope shows the tattered remains of a supernova explosion known as Cassiopeia A. It is the youngest known remnant from a supernova explosion in the Milky Way
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope shows the Eagle Nebula's 'Pillars of Creation'. The dust and gas in the pillars is seared by the intense radiation from young stars and eroded by strong winds from massive nearby stars
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The Cone Nebula, an innocuous pillar of gas and dust
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope An infrared image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows a protostellar object LRLL 54361 and its rich cosmic neighbourhood, a region called IC 348
(NASA, ESA, and J. Muzerolle (STScI)
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The tendrils of a dark interstellar cloud being destroyed by the passage of one of the brightest stars in the Pleiades star cluster
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The NGC 4038 and NGC 4039, known as the Antennae Galaxies
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Siding Spring captured on Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope
Nasa
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope NGC 6543, the Cat's Eye Nebula captured by the Hubble Telescope. A planetary nebula forms when Sun-like stars gently eject their outer gaseous layers that form bright nebulae
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Hubble Space Telescope shows Messier 57, the Ring Nebula
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Artist's concept of the star Fomalhaut and the Jupiter-type planet that the Hubble Space Telescope observed.
AP
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope A group of five galaxies known as Stephan's Quintet captured by Hubble. Three of the galaxies have distorted shapes, elongated spiral arms, and long, gaseous tidal tails containing myriad star clusters, proof of their close encounters
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope Illuminating: the 'Whirlpool Galaxy'
AP
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope The Hubble Mosaic of the Majestic Sombrero Galaxy
NASA/ESA and The Hubble Heritage Team STScI/AURA)
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Hubble Telescope This stunning image of NGC 1275 was taken using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys in July and August 2006.
NASA, ESA and Andy Fabian (University of Cambridge, UK)
25 years of the Hubble Telescope Even accounting for the aberration in Hubble's mirror, the space telescope's image (right) offers more clarity than what was generally possible with ground-based observations (left)
In 2018, the James Webb Space Telescope will be launched into orbit. But it won't immediately take over from Hubble, which will continue to be used alongside the new kit until it is retired.
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