Washington: The Hubble team successfully recovered the Advanced Camera for Surveys instrument, and it has started taking science observations once again after facing a glitch. On October 23, the joint mission of NASA and the European Space Agency, the science instruments on the Hubble Space Telescope issued error codes unexpectedly, indicating the loss of a specific synchronisation message.
As a result, the science instruments entered a safe mode configuration on October 25, while NASA continued investigating. "The camera was selected as the first instrument to recover as it faces the fewest complications should a lost message occur," NASA said. Over the past week, the mission team has continued investigating the root cause of the synchronisation issues and has seen no additional problems.
"The team will continue looking into possible short-term solutions this week and develop estimates for implementation," NASA said. Next, the team aims to return "the other instruments to operational status and resume their science observations". The Hubble team is focusing its efforts on isolating the hardware problem that commands the instruments and is part of the Science Instrument Command and Data Handling Unit.
Launched in 1990, Hubble has contributed to some of the most significant discoveries of our cosmos. The accelerating expansion of the universe, the evolution of galaxies over time, and the first atmospheric studies of planets beyond our solar system, among others. Its mission was to spend at least 15 years probing the farthest and faintest reaches of the cosmos, and it continues to exceed this goal.
