TECHNOLOGY REPORT - Astronomers Still Look to Hubble Space Telescope

This is the VOA Special English Technology Report.（VOA特别英语技术报道）

The Hubble Space Telescope continues to make valuable discoveries after more than twenty years in orbit around Earth.

哈勃空间望远镜在环绕地球轨道20多年后继续进行有价值的探索。

Hubble recently showed a fourth moon orbiting Pluto.Astronomers（天文学家） temporarily named it P4. 

The moon is the smallest to be discovered around the icydwarf(矮小的） planet.

Astronomers estimate that the moon isfrom thirteen to thirty-four kilometers across. 

They first saw it in a Hubble photo taken on June twenty-eighth.（6.28)

The American space agency NASA launched the Hubble Space Telescope in 1990. 

Reaching that day took years of work. 

Ed Weiler is NASA'schief astronomer. Mr. Weiler has worked closely with the Hubble program since 1979.

ED WEILER: "The Hubble, when it was launched, represented an increase in capability of other telescopes on the ground by a factor of ten. 

The last time in human history in astronomy that we leaped a factor of ten, in one step, was when Galileo stopped using his eye and put the first telescope to his eye."

人类历史上天文学上次飞跃一步提升十倍是伽利略将肉眼改用第一个望远镜进行观测。

NASA's first chief of astronomy was Nancy Grace Roman. 

Ms. Roman joined NASA in 1959. She led the effort thatresulted in the creation of the Hubble Space Telescope.

NANCY GRACE ROMAN: "Astronomers had been wanting to get observations from above the atmosphere for a long time.

Looking through the atmosphere is somewhat like looking through a piece of old,stained(玷污的、褪色的） glass. 

The glass has defects in it, so the image is blurred from that."

The Hubble telescope orbits about 550 kilometers above Earth. 

Ms. Roman says she still remembers the first images that it captured.

NANCY GRACE ROMAN: "I think the image that to me was most striking was the center of a globular(球状的） cluster. 

You could see each star individually, and see their color, and it was just a fantastic sight."

The Hubble Space Telescope has helped expand our knowledge of the universe. 

It helped scientists estimate that the universe began about 14 billion years ago. 

Earlier estimates had placed it between ten and twenty billion years old.

Ed Weiler says the Hubble telescope also confirmed the existence of black holes. 

These are extremelydense masses believed to exist at the center of most galaxies. 

Their gravitational（万有引力） pull is so strong, they absorb light.

ED WEILER: "Black holes were science fiction. 'Star Trek（旅行）,' 'Star Wars.'

'Black holes -- nice theory but nobody believes in them, right?' Hubble proved they exist."

The Hubble Space Telescope completed its one millionth scientific observation in July.

在7月，哈勃天文望远镜完成了它的第100万次科学观测。 

NASA is building a new space telescope to look even deeper into the beginnings of the universe.

And that's the VOA Special English Technology Report, written by June Simms and Julie Taboh. 

You can watch a video about the Hubble Space Telescope at www.unsv.com. I'm Steve Ember.