NASA's Hubble Space Telescope is back in operation on July 17 after a hiatus of more than a month, after the controllers succeeded in operating the backup computer on board the observatory.
In a statement issued on July 19, NASA said that the telescope's instruments have returned to work nearly 5 weeks after the computer that controls these instruments failed.
It is expected that the recent maintenance process will extend the life of the observatory until the end of the current decade.
Bringing Hubble back to life
On June 13, the computer that controls the scientific instruments on board the observatory suddenly stopped working.
After failing to receive a signal from Hubble, the main computer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland automatically put the observatory's science instruments into safe mode.
This means that the telescope stops working and enters a coma, after which it may not return to work at all.
Meanwhile, the Hubble team moved quickly to investigate what had hit the observatory, which orbits Earth at an altitude of 547 kilometers.
NASA had to call in veteran engineers among those who oversaw the design and operation of the Hubble instrument in 1990.
After weeks of investigation, engineers concluded that the most likely cause of the problem with the main computer on board the observatory was a malfunction in the control unit that powers the instruments.
With the power controller unable to be reset from the ground, engineers decided to rely instead on the science instrument controller's power unit and data backups.
This transition to backup devices began on July 15, and two days later, NASA announced that it had successfully started the backup computer system and restored control of the scientific instruments after they were removed from the safe mode in which they had been placed since the middle of last month.
"I am proud of the Hubble team, current and former members who have stepped in to offer their support and expertise. Thanks to their dedication, Hubble will continue to build on its 31-year legacy, expanding our horizons with its vision of the universe," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.
New photos taken by Hubble after the maintenance operation (NASA)
Hubble team concerns
The weeks-long effort to get Hubble back to work normally and with the same efficiency as usual, and it was able to experimentally capture two minutes, one of the collision of two distant galaxies and the other of a unique spiral galaxy, as indicated by a report by Phys.org issued on July 20 current.
However, the recent outage, the longest among the outages that have occurred in recent years, has raised concerns about the telescope's future, especially since it is not the first time that Hubble has had to rely on backup devices.
The observatory's control team made a similar switch in 2008, returning Hubble to normal after the failure of another part of the scientific instrumentation, command and data processing unit that was completely changed in 2009, significantly extending its operational life.
Since that maintenance mission, Hubble has made more than 600,000 observations, out of a total of 1.5 million it has made in its lifetime.
Researchers hope Hubble will continue to explore the universe for another 10 years (Max Pixel)
Ongoing Achievements
Hubble had contributed to some of the most important discoveries in the universe, including the revelations of the accelerating expansion of the universe, the evolution of galaxies, and the first studies of the atmospheres of planets outside our solar system.
His assignments included spending at least 15 years exploring the farthest and weakest regions of the universe, but he far exceeded that goal.
Despite the recent problems, astronomers remain optimistic that Hubble will continue to do well for many more years.
At a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in early June, before the last failure, officials at the Space Telescope Science Institute said they were working on initiatives to extend the life of the telescope and its instruments until the late 2030s.