Upgraded Hubble To Be 90 Times As Powerful 194
The feed brings us a New Scientist review of the repairs and new instruments that astronauts will bring to the Hubble Space Telescope next August (unless the launch is delayed). The resulting instrument will be 90 times as powerful as Hubble was designed to be when launched, and 60% more capable than it was after its flawed optics were repaired in 1993. If the astronauts pull it off — and the mission is no slam-dunk — the space telescope should be able to image galaxies back to 400 million years after the Big Bang.
Huh, I must have blinked. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Huh, I must have blinked. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Huh, I must have blinked. (Score:5, Informative)
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I am quite certain that former astronauts (and prospective ones) when asked if they would do a garbage cleanup mission in orbit would say "Absolutely, In a heartbeat."
I would, wouldn't you?
(thats not to say hubble isn't worthy at all, it has produced some of the greatest images of space seen so far)
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Just prior to the "Return To Flight" mission after the Columbia mission, I had the opportunity to talk to two retired shuttle astronauts, one of whom had been involved in the first Hubble servicing mission. I asked them whether given the opportunity, they'd be willing to fly another mission to the Hubble even without the post-Columbia modifications. To a man, they both said "Absolutely, In a heartbeat." In their eyes, the Hubble was one of the few truly useful missions performed by the space shuttle.
I love space science and I love manned spaceflight, I geek out over this like you wouldn't believe. But with all these cost overruns and the shuttle being so frickin' expensive, the whole idea of servicing a device in space as being "cost effective" is laughable. The cost of launching is so high, it would be cheaper just to treat things like the Hubble as disposable and just send up a brand new satellite with the upgrades in place rather than trying to retrofit them on hardware in space.
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Actually no. The first thing he did was to cancel the planned unmanned robotic upgrade that was approved by the previous director. That system was almost completed. If that was allowed to go ahead the Hubble would have been repaired by now.
Griffin only reinstated the shuttle rescue plan after a lot of opposition from the scientific community.
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Hubble: Reminder about bloody pictures (Score:3, Insightful)
Most people don't care how or why a roses exist, it is enough that they are beautiful and fragrant and inspiring.
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Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Informative)
What could we do with an extra $350 million?
We could finance about 7 hours of the war in Iraq?
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Insightful)
In the end, less people get hurt, less people get really pissed of and we end up with better pictures.
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:4, Insightful)
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Now THAT is a colossal waste of money. Why would anyone give money to a bunch of teenagers when they are stupid enough to develop and release software for free? Besides. who gets to decide what is useful to develop and what isn't? What's useful for one may be a complete waste of time to someone else.
Software dev
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There's hardly anything more important to help build the future of our over populated planet than fundamental science.
Hubble type astronomy and the space hi-tech that it needs has through the last 50 years been what has driven progress.
Of course you could argue it was the military that drove this hi-tech development, in that case giving up this Hubble restoration would pay for at least an other day of Iraq.
Whatever you feel gives the better payback...
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Interesting)
That may be true but there also may be benefits in learning to repair what we have, that go beyond merely the "launch and trash" philosophy, i.e. when resources are limited. What kinds of new technologies will be spawned to learn how to repair existing stuff in space and what will be learned I think is just as valuable since sooner or later we will have to learn whether others want it or not.
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Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:5, Insightful)
What you have not done, at all, in either of your posts here is offer a single reason that hubble is undeserving of these funds. Clearly, you think hubble is a wast of money. Clearly its a lot of money and other areas of research could benefit from getting it instead.
Re:Hubble: Right answer to wrong question (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm sure Max Planck would be quite amazed at what we've gotten done using the concept of quantum, even though it seemed to be little more than a mathematical trick when he first thought of it.
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Usual editorial fuck up (Score:2, Informative)
Red shift balls (Score:5, Funny)
That's about how long it feels like it's been since my last big bang.
What's a bang? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Red shift balls (Score:5, Funny)
Got married didn't ya.
How times have changed (Score:2)
The Slashdot crowd, circa 2008: We can't get laid 'cause we're all married.
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Was Hubble worth it? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Was Hubble worth it? (Score:5, Insightful)
The fundamental problem with your statement is that you assume that the $$$ would otherwise have been used to change lives in a big positive way.
Put very simply, through science, we gain an understanding of the world, and universe around us, how it operates and how we can interact more effectively with it.
Re:Was Hubble worth it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now of course the direct link between Hubble telescope and daily applications is less obvious, but it did determine the Hubble constant (well a more accurate estimate) and determined that the expansion of the universe was accelerating... Now you can challenge the usefulness of these discoveries all you can, but I somehow believe that in the long run, understanding the physics that rule this universe will generate vastly more practical applications (and revenues) then the current (and already beaten) missile defense system...
In the long run we're all dead, but that doesn't mean we should focus solely on short term objectives (and I'm very very glad our ancestors didn't)/
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Put very simply though, that still means basically nothing. I have not, and I'd venture to guess the average Joe, has not benefited directly from Hubble.
You just said it, this stuff is not for the average Joe that you apparently identify with.
This stuff called science is done by very special Joe's, usually the best of the crop but never average.
And the results are there for all people even though they might only be appreciated by those who had more than average education.
That's the curse of fundamental science, so few (including GWB) understand the awesome impact it has.
Re:Was Hubble worth it? (Score:5, Informative)
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"NASA's TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER PROGRAM FOR TEE EARLY DETECTION OF BREAST CANCER", available at ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel4/5216/14105/00646457.pdf?tp=&isnumber=&arnumber=646457
One NASA-driven development has already found its way into clinical use as part of the LORAD; stereotactic needle
biopsy system. The charge-coupled device (CCD) camera used in this system was originally designed and built for use
in the Hubble Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, and provides a high-resolution, high-contrast image in real time
to guide a physician in the accurate collection of a biopsy sample from suspicious imaged breast lesions. The Hubble
CCD, coupled with a high-speed phosphor screen, gives greatly increased sensitivity, contrast and resolution over
previous methods, The result is a less traumatic, lower cost ($800 vs. $2,500 typically for surgical biopsy), non-surgical biopsy procedure for the more than 500,000 American women who undergo breast biopsies each year.
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Here, Hubble directly increased the ability for us to find cancers. When you look at a dollar amount, (2500-800)*500000 gives us $0.85 billion per year. Note that this article was published in 1996; today, mammograms and biopsies are much more common. To keep things simple, if we assume a constant number of patients, the Hubble CCD alone has directly resulted in cost savings of $9.35 billion (let alone lives saved). Also note that the cost of scalpel biopsies is mostly based on labor, and so would not have dropped much beyond the $2500 level; CCD's have become very inexpensive (relative to costs in 1996) and so the savings would actually be significantly larger than calculated here.
Anyone know the true cost of a non-surgical biopsy today?
Bullcra (Score:2)
There was a definite need for CCD imaging whether or not the Hobbled was built. If there was a $9.35 billion value for live imaging of breast tumors then it would have been researched and developed regardless, and more efficiently than by putting up a huge mirror into space. It's not like no one thought of the technology besides space telescope supporters
Mind you, I'm not necessarily knocking the Rubble telescope - that I leave for
Re:Bullcra (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:Was Hubble worth it? (Score:5, Interesting)
Investing in science makes sense (Score:3, Interesting)
Money spent on pure science is usually a good investment because the returns are cumulative. The new knowledge that we gain can potentially benefit the human race in all perpetuity.
E.g. Of the immense amount of technology that gives you the ability to post here in Slashdot large port
Investing in other science makes more sense... (Score:2)
But, if as is probably the case, that the money was only available to science in the form of the Hubble due to defense tie-ins, NASA PR, or some other political factors, then I agree that the money was better spent than being sunk into corporate welfare programs...
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You even have to subtract about 500 million dollars from the 6,5 billion, as that is the contribution of the ESA to the mission. (See FAQ item 10 [spacetelescope.org] (that page also must have been made in space, because who on Earth would sort a FAQ in reverse order and not even put anchors to the items on it)). So about $20 for each in the US and below $1 for us Europeans, not that it makes a difference and I fully agree with you.
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If you want to consider real money, consider the > 450 billion dollars spent over the last 5 years on the Iraq war, or the 450 Billion dollar Defense budget spent every year which doesn't even include war operations.
According to this page [nationalpriorities.org], we have spend closer to $485 billion so far and the works out to about $275 million per day or $0.92 per day for every man, woman and child in America, versus only $0.003 per day over the life of Hubble.
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At least if they are going to spend the money in the way they are now, they should change it back to what it was before the marketers got a hold of it in 1947 - the War Department. A lot more honest.
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I still could agree with that. But I don't thing you should compare it with what that money could have done "on earth", but how it compares to other space projects. And then I personally think that the Hubble project as a whole was much more useful than let's say a shuttle bringing some fresh food to the space station and getting its garbage back.
Or a bit stronger, what was a better space program, the Hubble telescope or putting a couple of guys on the moo
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Its a tiny, tiny amount though. The problem is that the space program has always been blown by the political winds. People remember that once, long ago, it did indeed consume vast amounts of cash, and they assume this continues today. NASA then and NASA
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Just think if we took all the money being spent on science around the world and spent it on food instead. We could fix world hunger! Thats what I call a long term solution.
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"big positive way" doesn't necessarily equate to giving people handouts or curing diabetes. If all we ever spent our money on was egalitarianism, our lives would be so boring we wouldn't see the point. I'm very happy that money has been spent on hubble, and its findings never cease to excite me.
You could say the same for... (Score:2)
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Maybe, since your gut is pretty much a stimulus/response organ with no real capability for thought. The fact that you're taking socio-economic theories from it suggests that you might be easily swayed.
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The fact that for every picture it takes, it disproves the Bible literalists' position ever so slightly more. For me, that's billions well spent. Besides you can take any government program and ask what have we really gotten out of it. A few billion is a lot cheaper than wh
Pictures smictures... (Score:2, Funny)
That's what we want to know.
what "90 times more powerful means" (Score:5, Informative)
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Isn't this just a fancy way of saying they're interested in capturing fainter objects?
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Anyway, if the HST is going to be 90% more powerful and 60% more capable, by my calculation that means it'll be 304% more awesome. Three w00ts for NASA!
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(The strength of ten Grinches plus two!)
60% better than the 2002 Hubble, not 1993 (Score:5, Informative)
FTA: "HST will be about 60% more powerful than it was right after the third servicing mission, before ACS and STIS failed."
The 1993 servicing mission generally restored the designed capabilities of the Hubble, the so-called "factor of 90" that the article mentions. Major new improvements and capabilities came with each servicing mission, culminating in the March 2002 servicing mission that installed the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS).
The upcoming installation of the new Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) will improve the combined sensitivity and field of view by 60% over the Hubble as it was after March 2002 (and before ACS died).
To be fair... by the same metric, modern ground-based telescopes with large format CCD and infrared arrays are on the order of 100 times more powerful than they were in 1990 as well. In the near infrared, the gains are closer to a factor of 1000!
What Big Bang? (Score:3, Funny)
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Re:What Big Bang? (Score:4, Insightful)
Talking to Americans (Score:2)
Its not really a lie when you are too stupid and just believe anything anyone tells you.
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Then again, any minister running for the presidency would not have gotten my vote regardless, but at least he believes the lies he spouts. The rest of the candidates have no such excuse for theirs.
1.6 (Score:3, Insightful)
Designed as flawed? (Score:3, Insightful)
Or, to put it the other way, is this improvement actually 60% (still a lot!) over current situation, and the "90 times as powerful" is basically just bullshit hype?
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The REAL Question (Score:2)
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Why yes, but, the real question is... will it blend?
2007 just called, they want their viral marketing Internet meme back.
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So can we now point it to the moon? (Score:2)
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Take not Bring (Score:2)
Should read:
The feed brings us a New Scientist review of the repairs and new instruments that astronauts will take to the Hubble Space Telescope next August (unless the launch is delayed).
How can they bring it if they're not there yet?
Hubble mission will probably be canceled (Score:2)
How about looking a bit closer to home (Score:2)
Re:Awesome! (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.daviddarling.info/images/Cats_Eye_Nebula.jpg [daviddarling.info]
http://www.uni-sw.gwdg.de/~panders/Images/AstroImages/03_CatEyeNebula.jpg [uni-sw.gwdg.de]
http://www.spacetoday.org/images/Hubble/HubbleBeauty/CatsEyeNebulaNASA.jpg [spacetoday.org]
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/NGC6543.jpg [wikimedia.org]
http://www.daviddarling.info/images/Cats_Eye_Nebula_2.jpg [daviddarling.info]
The interpretation of the horsehead nebula is at least consistent (most of the time), but there is still plenty of artistic license being taken.
http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/52238main_MM_image_feature_89_jw4.jpg [nasa.gov]
http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/45506main_MM_Image_Feature_73_rs4.jpg [nasa.gov]
http://www.geocities.com/scott_metz/alternity/graphics/horsehead_nebula.jpg [geocities.com]
http://www.sidewalk-astronomy-club.com/img/horsehead-nebula.jpg [sidewalk-a...y-club.com]
http://www.fourthdimensionastroimaging.com/sitebuilder/images/horsehead-712x571.jpg [fourthdime...maging.com]
I was sort of disappointed when I found that out...
Re:Awesome! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Then you'd have to look at three times as many pictures to get the same amount of information, and none of them would be as pleasing to the human eye.
The convention that NASA seems to use is that they map the lowest-frequency channel to red, the middle to green, and the highest to blue. That's about as consistent as you can get when dealing with multispectral imagery.
If you really want black and white, just use the GIM
Re:Awesome! (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Awesome! (Score:5, Informative)
From the site:
Finished color images are actually combinations of two or more black-and-white exposures to which color has been added during image processing.
The colors in Hubble images, which are assigned for various reasons, aren't always what we'd see if we were able to visit the imaged objects in a spacecraft. We often use color as a tool, whether it is to enhance an object's detail or to visualize what ordinarily could never be seen by the human eye
Re:Awesome! (Score:4, Insightful)
The thing is, without coloration, we wouldn't be able to see the various structures. Astronomers probably would, being trained, but not us normal folk. Besides, who wants to look at dull greyscale when you can spice it up with some color? The aim of making the image easier to interpret is achieved, and it looks pretty too.
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Re:planning for James Webb Space Telescope upgrade (Score:3, Interesting)
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