From Whence We Came

Not to linger on astronomy, but after seeing that last shot of Saturn I was going to compile a collection of my favorite Hubble images cropped into desktops, only to find the intertubes already beat me to it. So here is, at least to my knowledge, the definitive collection of HST imagery (read: all the good shots). Thumbnails link to the original versions at HubbleSite.

LINK/IMAGES [images.lunarpages.com]

But seriously what kind of friend would I be if I made you click all those links?

TORRENT [HST widescreen desktops (1920x1200, 170 MB)] TORRENT [HST fullscreen desktops (1600x1200, 147 MB)]

DIRECT DOWNLOAD [widescreen] DIRECT DOWNLOAD [fullscreen]

Also of note: Hubble, in collaboration with terrestrial observatories, recently studying the nearest known extrasolar planet (a Jupiter-sized world orbiting the Sun-like star Epsilon Eridani, only 10.5 light-years away), found that …

(…) the planet’s orbit is tilted 30 degrees to our line of sight, which is the same inclination as a disk of dust and gas that also encircles Epsilon Eridani. This is a particularly exciting result because, although it has long been inferred that planets form from such disks, this is the first time that the two objects have been observed around the same star.

Stars spinning out planets spinning out moons, babies, Edwin Hubble, physical cosmology, blog posts about physical cosmology …

What’s more:

The planet is so close it may be observable by Hubble and large ground-based telescopes in late 2007, when the planet makes its closest approach to Epsilon Eridani during its 6.9-year orbit.

ARTICLE [“Hubble Observations Confirm (…)”] (NASA)

Update: Here’s more Hubble – many are duplicated in the link above but there are enough unique to justify checking out:

LINK/IMAGES [Hubble Heritage Image Gallery]