SPACE.com -- NASA Sees Surge in Demand for Astronomers to Use Hubble

The Omega Nebula, a hotbed of newly born stars wrapped in colorful blankets of glowing gas and cradled in an enormous cold, dark hydrogen cloud. The nebula, also called M17 and the SwanNebula, resides 5,500 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius.

This picture, taken by the newly installed Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, shows the upper 2.5 light-years of the Cone Nebula (NGC 2264), a height that equals 23 million roundtrips to the Moon. The entire nebula is 7 light-years long. The Cone Nebula resides 2,500 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros.

This picture of the galaxy UGC 10214 was taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), which was installed aboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in March during Servicing Mission 3B. Dubbed the Tadpole, this spiral galaxy is unlike the textbook images of stately galaxies. Its distorted shape was caused by a small interloper, a very blue, compact galaxy visible in the upper left corner of the more massive Tadpole.

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	NASA Sees Surge in Demand for Astronomers to Use Hubble By Kelly Young FLORIDA TODAY posted: 05:00 pm ET 01 May 2002

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- With the upgrades provided by shuttle Columbia in March, the Hubble Space Telescope has become very popular with scientists.

For every astronomer who uses the telescope, eight more are turned away. Hubble has not seen that kind of demand since it first launched in 1990.

Astronomers must submit a proposal to get viewing time on the telescope. Fellow astronomers then weed through the proposals and select ones with the most scientific merit.

While scientists at NASA headquarters in Washington were gushing about Hubble's latest photogenic finds on Tuesday, those at Space Congress took a broader look at the agency's precious popular observatory.

"The secret of Hubble is its continuity," said Frank Cepollina, Hubble's servicing project manager.

Hubble is NASA's most productive mission in terms of worldwide scientific achievement in all areas of science between 1973-2001, according to Cepollina. That includes Galileo, Voyager and Viking missions, among others.

Planet hunters are among those who will take a peak behind Hubble's new eyes. Some of the telescope's upcoming targets include:

Gliese 229B, a brown dwarf discovered in 1995, to look for a flicker in the dwarf's light. This is characteristic of a planet passing in front of a star.

Large number of disks around stars that might house planets.

Alpha Centauri, the closest star to the sun. Astronomers will look for Jupiter-sized planets.

"If we don't do it, we'll regret it," Mark Clampin, who is in charge of the detectors on the new Advanced Camera for Surveys, told 150 people at Space Congress.

In the coming weeks, NASA will turn on the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer. Columbia's crew added a new coolant system to the camera.

Once reactivated, this camera will be able to see past the space dust that obscures new stars.

The fifth mission to service Hubble is already being prepared. Russell Werneth, Hubble's spacewalk manager, said he is starting to map out the 2004 shuttle launch.

And Hubble's successor already is being planned.

Two companies, TRW-Ball and Lockheed Martin, are vying for the contract to build the Next Generation Space Telescope, which could launch as early as 2010.

It costs about $200 million a year to maintain Hubble, so having both Next Generation Space Telescope and Hubble operating at the same time would be costly, and therefore unlikely.

Space Congress continues through Friday at the Radisson Resort at the Port in Cape Canaveral.