From the desk of the ESA/Hubble Project Scientist
What an amazing spring that Hubble is having! We have just celebrated the 27th anniversary of the launch of this extraordinary mission, and Hubble is still going strong. We received a record number of proposals before the Cycle 25 deadline (7 April): 1208 proposals were submitted, requesting 23 383 prime Hubble orbits in Cycle 25 alone. Once again, we saw a very significant European participation, with 22% of the proposals submitted by PIs from ESA member states. The Time Allocation Committee will have both a fun and difficult time allocating the available orbits to the best proposals. As always, several European astronomers will be involved in the review and we look forward to welcoming them at STScI in June. For all of you waiting to hear the final outcome, stay tuned for those Blacker emails that will arrive by the end of June.
It was great to see so many of you at the fifth conference in the series Science with the Hubble Space Telescope, this time expanded to include the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, which is only 16 months away from launch. Exciting! And with Hubble expected to remain a viable observatory into the 2022s, we dedicated this conference to the many synergies between Hubble and Webb. The Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti in Venice provided a splendid backdrop to five days of lively discussions. All speakers took the SOC instructions very seriously, and provided their unique and creative predictions of the major breakthroughs that the two missions will make in a very complementary fashion. You can read here about the details on the amazing breadth of the science that was covered during the conference.
Finally, after a very successful run we just closed the first installation of Our Place in Space, an art & science exhibit based on beautiful Hubble images. The exhibit was shown in Venice, at the Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti from 1 February to 17 April, and was visited by almost 30 000 people. This result exceeded even our most optimistic expectations, proving one more time that there is a huge public interest for science-based initiatives that both inform and inspire. Our Place in Space has now moved to the medieval town of Chiavenna, Italy, where it will be shown from 13 May to 20 August. If you missed it in Venice, do consider a trip to Chiavenna, which is also famous for its beautiful view of the Alps. Several other exhibition locations are planned for next year, and given the amazing success in Venice, we are looking for additional locations in Europe. If you are interested in hosting Our Place in Space at your local museum or institution, get in touch! We will be delighted to work with you and you will find it a very worthwhile initiative that will greatly enrich your local community.
Antonella Nota
ESA HST Project Scientist, STScI
Email: nota@stsci.edu
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18 May 2017: On 20 March, we have convened in Venice to host the 5th conference in the signature series Science with the Hubble Space Telescope. This time, the conference expanded to include the synergy with the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. Hubble is still going strong, and is expected to remain a viable observatory well into 2022. Webb is planned ...
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18 May 2017: Even before its launch, the press began to report on the new Hubble travelling exhibition Our Place in Space. Mainly Italian national and regional media covered the launch of the exhibition in Venice, Italy, but international media picked up the new exhibition as well.
Digital Trends announced it as an exhibition “quite literally out of this world.” Italy24 described the ...
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18 May 2017:
Since the first release of the European Hubble Archive eHST in October 2015, several new features and improvements have been added, further increasing its use for the scientific community. The current version, as of April 2017, is version 1.2.6. This version adds three new main features.
The developers of eHST are constantly searching for new ways to improve ...
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18 May 2017: One of the key roles of ESA/Hubble is to advertise and promote science from European astronomers. ESA/Hubble provides the resources, the connections and the infrastructure to develop and disseminate Hubble science stories for European astronomers. 2016 was very successful in this respect, with a high number of produced press releases covering a wide variety of different topics, all ...
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