What is significant about the Hubble Space Telescope?

The Hubble Space Telescope is significant primarily because it has provided detailed images of distant galaxies, allowing astronomers to make groundbreaking discoveries about the universe. Launched in 1990, Hubble has captured high-resolution images that reveal the structure of galaxies, nebulae, and other cosmic phenomena with unprecedented clarity. These images have not only advanced our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution but have also contributed vastly to our knowledge of the universe's composition, age, and the existence of dark matter.

Hubble's ability to operate above the blurring effects of Earth's atmosphere enables it to achieve far superior visual clarity than ground-based telescopes. This capability has made it a vital tool in researching various astronomical questions and has led to significant milestones, including the measurement of the rate of expansion of the universe and discovering the existence of exoplanets through secondary studies, though it was not the first telescope specifically dedicated to that pursuit.

The details provided by Hubble have helped bridge theoretical models with observational data, fundamentally transforming our understanding of cosmology.