Back in July of 2004 Astronomers at the Space Telescope Science Institute unveiled the deepest portrait of the visible universe ever achieved by humankind. Called the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF), the million-second-long exposure reveals the first galaxies to emerge from the so-called "dark ages," the time shortly after the big bang when the first stars reheated the cold, dark universe. The new image should offer new insights into what types of objects reheated the universe long ago.
This historic new view is actually two separate images taken by Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) and the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-object Spectrometer (NICMOS). Both images reveal galaxies that are too faint to be seen by ground-based telescopes, or even in Hubble's previous faraway looks, called the Hubble Deep Fields (HDFs), taken in 1995 and 1998.
Credit: NASA, ESA, S. Beckwith (STScI) and the HUDF Team
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Want to know where in the sky the HUDF can be found?
Simply find Orion and from there go down and to the right between the constellation Eridanus and Fornax (hint: the top left star of Eridanus is just under Orion's left leg (remember not your left but Orion's) Here is a 3d graphical map to help.
One last thing. If you - like me - wondered how deep the Hubble Ultra Deep Field really was, relative to the current universe? Then this cool Nasa graphic I found will help. It does a great job at attemping to illustrate the concept.
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