How a 36-year-old telescope still captures the universe's deepest secrets

Space · Published 18 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Having traveled over 5 billion miles, Hubble remains a vital tool for exploring the cosmos. By utilizing gravitational lensing and its unique capacity to revisit specific regions of the sky, the telescope is currently hunting for a recurring supernova to help refine our understanding of the universe's expansion rate.

Despite its three-decade tenure, Hubble remains a primary tool for mapping the universe's expansion. On September 19, 2026, the telescope reached a milestone of 200,000 orbits around Earth. This longevity is fueled by a massive demand for its data; astronomers currently request approximately seven times more observing time than is actually available each year.

One of Hubble's most sophisticated techniques involves using massive galaxy clusters as natural magnifying glasses. Light from distant background entities is distorted and enlarged by the massive galaxy cluster MACS J0417, which functions as a gravitational lens. This allows astronomers to see objects that would otherwise be too faint or distant to detect. By observing these lensed regions, scientists can refine the Hubble Constant—the measurement of the universe's expansion rate.

A prime example of this is the study of Supernova Athena. Originally discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope in 2025, Athena's light travels along multiple paths due to the gravitational lens. This causes the same stellar explosion to appear more than once to observers on Earth, with reappearances separated by months or even years. By timing these reappearances, researchers can map the mass of the foreground cluster and gain a clearer picture of cosmic history.

Hubble's specific strengths in ultraviolet and visible wavelengths provide a necessary complement to the James Webb and Roman Space Telescopes. Its current portfolio includes monitoring the most distant object ever seen—a compact galaxy of blue stars from 13.2 billion years ago—while simultaneously maintaining its role as a workhorse for diverse astronomical targets across every field of study.

General information, not professional advice. Spotted an error? Flag the card or see corrections and complaints.

Intellect Plus is a visual educational discovery platform for exploring fascinating facts and ideas. Brain Food, Not Brain Rot. What is Intellect Plus?

Related

• The telescope built for a decade that has lasted thirty years
• How a single telescope can see billions of years into the past
• After twenty-five years in orbit, Hubble has fundamentally rewritten our understanding of the universe.
• The telescope designed for 15 years has survived over 36 orbits
• Why the Hubble Space Telescope remains astronomy's greatest leap since Galileo
• A pinhead of sky revealed a cosmic zoo of galaxies
• Why the Hubble Space Telescope is effectively a functional time machine for astronomers
• Saturn's south pole is growing a new geometric neighbor
• Hubble accidentally captures a rare, real-time look at a comet disintegrating in space.
• How NASA uses radio waves to weigh a metal-rich asteroid
• Why five galaxies are currently locked in a slow-motion, billion-year cosmic collision
• How NASA plans to photograph a hidden metallic world

More in Astronomy · More in Space · Latest · A–Z · All topics