When Was the Hubble Deep Field Image Taken?
Quick Answer
The original Hubble Deep Field image was taken between 18 and 28 December 1995, when the Hubble Space Telescope was pointed at an apparently empty patch of sky for 10 consecutive days, revealing about 3,000 galaxies in an area smaller than a grain of sand held at arm's length.
The Full Story
In one of the boldest decisions in astronomy history, Hubble director Robert Williams devoted 10 days of precious telescope time to staring at a seemingly empty speck of sky in the constellation Ursa Major, about the size of a tennis ball at 100 metres. Many astronomers thought this would waste valuable observing time. The result was revolutionary: the Hubble Deep Field image revealed about 3,000 galaxies of various ages, shapes, and sizes, some dating back to when the universe was less than 1 billion years old. Follow-up observations expanded the discoveries: the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (2004) went even deeper, exposing about 10,000 galaxies with light from as far back as 400 million years after the Big Bang. The James Webb Space Telescope JADES survey (2023) has pushed this frontier further, detecting galaxies from just 300 million years after the Big Bang. These images demonstrated that the observable universe contains at least 200 billion galaxies.
Key Facts
YouTube Angle
Suggested video title for this topic:
"The Hubble Deep Field — The Most Important Photo Ever Taken"