Starburst Galaxy NGC 1808: This image, taken with the Hubble telescope's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2(WFPC2), provides a close-up view of the galaxy's center, the hotbed of vigorous star formation.

Name: IRAS 05059-3734, NGC 1808
Type: Local Universe : Galaxy : Activity : Starburst
Category: Galaxies
Constellation: Columba
Distance: 40 million light years
Release date: 22 March 1998, 06:00
Credit: Jim Flood, an amateur astronomer affiliated with Sperry Observatory at Union College in New Jersey, and Max Mutchler, a member of the  Space Telescope Science Institute staff who volunteered to work with Jim

Starburst galaxy NGC 1808: The ground-based image shows that the galaxy has an unusual, warped shape. Most spiral galaxies are flat disks, but this one has curls of dust and gas at its outer spiral arms (upper right-hand corner and lower left-hand corner). This peculiar shape is evidence that NGC 1808 may have had a close interaction with another nearby galaxy, NGC 1792, which is not in the picture Such an interaction could have hurled gas towards the nucleus of NGC 1808, triggering the exceptionally high rate of star birth seen in the WFPC2 inset image.

Name: IRAS 05059-3734, NGC 1808
Type: Local Universe : Galaxy : Activity : Starburst
Category: Galaxies
Release date: 22 March 1998, 06:00
Credit: Jim Flood, an amateur astronomer affiliated with Sperry Observatory at Union College in New Jersey, and Max Mutchler, a member of the  Space Telescope Science Institute staff who volunteered to work with Jim

Comet Hyakutake - C/1996 B2: The left image, shown in red, was taken through a narrow-band red filter that shows only sunlight scattered by dust particles in the inner coma of the comet. The right image, shown in blue was taken with an ultraviolet 'Woods' filter image that shows the distribution of scattered ultraviolet radiation from hydrogen atoms in the inner coma.

Name: Hyakutake
Type: Solar System : Interplanetary Body : Comet : Coma
Category: Solar System
Release date: 27 March 1998, 06:00
Credit: M.R. Combi (The University of Michigan)

Turbulent Cauldron of Starbirth in Nearby Active Galaxy: The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope offers a stunning unprecedented close-up view of a turbulent firestorm of starbirth along a nearly edge-on dust disk girdling Centaurus A, the nearest active galaxy to Earth.

Name: Centaurus A, IRAS 13225-4245, NGC 5128
Type: Local Universe : GalaxyLocal Universe : Galaxy : Component : Central Black Hole
Category: Galaxies
Distance: 11 million light years
Release date: 14 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA

Centaurus A Nucleus: Astronomers have used the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope to probe the core of the nearest active galaxy to Earth, Centaurus A.

Name: Centaurus A, IRAS 13225-4245, NGC 5128
Type: Local Universe : GalaxyLocal Universe : Galaxy : Component : Central Black Hole
Category: Galaxies
Distance: 11 million light years
Release date: 14 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA

Turbulent Cauldron of Starbirth in Nearby Active Galaxy: The picture is a mosaic of two Hubble Space Telescope images taken with the Wide Field Planetary Camera 2, on Aug. 1, 1997 and Jan. 10, 1998. The approximately natural colour is assembled from images taken in blue, green and red light. Details as small as seven light-years across can be resolved. The blue colour is due to the light from extremely hot, newborn stars. The reddish-yellow colour is due in part to hot gas, in part to older stars in the elliptical galaxy and in part to scattering of blue light by dust -- the same effect that produces brilliant orange sunsets on Earth.

Name: Centaurus A, NGC 5128
Type: Local Universe : GalaxyLocal Universe : Galaxy : Component : Central Black Hole
Category: Galaxies
Constellation: Centaurus
Distance: 11 million light years
Release date: 14 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA

Turbulent Cauldron of Starbirth in nearby active galaxy (ground-based image): This ground-based telescopic view shows that the dust lane girdles the entire elliptical galaxy. This lane has long been considered the dust remnant of a smaller spiral galaxy that merged with the large elliptical galaxy.

Name: Centaurus A, IRAS 13225-4245, NGC 5128
Type: Local Universe : Galaxy : Type : Elliptical
Category: GalaxiesQuasars and Black Holes
Release date: 14 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: NOAO

Centaurus A Nucleus: A close-up high resolution Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 image of the dramatic dust disk which is thought to be the remnant of a smaller spiral galaxy that merged with the large elliptical galaxy. The shock of the collision compressed interstellar gas, precipitating a flurry of star formation and giving the material a fleecy pattern. Dark filaments of dust mixed with cold hydrogen gas are silhouetted against the incandescent yellow-orange glow from stars behind it.

Name: Centaurus A, NGC 5128
Type: Local Universe : GalaxyLocal Universe : Galaxy : Component : Central Black Hole
Category: Galaxies
Constellation: Centaurus
Distance: 11 million light years
Release date: 14 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: E.J. Schreier, (STScI) and NASA/ESA

Hot White Dwarf Shines in Young Star Cluster: A dazzling 'jewel-box' collection of over 20, 000 stars can be seen in crystal clarity in this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image, taken with the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2. The young (40 million year old) cluster, called NGC 1818, is 164, 000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way. The LMC, a site of vigorous current star formation, is an ideal nearby laboratory for studying stellar evolution.

Name: NGC 1818
Type: Local Universe : Star : Grouping : Cluster
Category: Star Clusters
Constellation: Dorado
Distance: 170000 light years
Release date: 9 April 1998, 06:00
Credit: Rebecca Elson and Richard Sword, Cambridge UK, and NASA/ESA (Original WFPC2image courtesy J. Westphal, Caltech)

Hot white dwarf shines in young star cluster (Ground based view of the area containing NGC 1818): Ground-based image of the Large Magellanic Cloud.

Name: IRAS 05240-6948, Large Magellanic Cloud, LMC, NGC 1818
Type: Local Universe : Galaxy
Category: Galaxies
Release date: 9 April 1998, 06:00
Credit: NASA & ESA

Gamma ray burst 971214: Image of the GRB 971214 field, obtained with the Hubble Space Telescope about four months after the burst, well after the afterglow has faded away. The extremely faint and distant galaxy (in the center) is the host galaxy of the gamma-ray burst. It was discovered earlier using the Keck 10-m telescope, but it is shown here as seen with a superior sharpness of the HST.

Name: Gamma Ray Burst, GRB 971214
Type: Early Universe : Cosmology : Phenomenon : Gamma Ray Burst
Category: CosmologyMiscellaneous
Constellation: Ursa Major
Release date: 6 May 1998, 06:00
Credit: S. R. Kulkarni and S. G. Djorgovski (Caltech), the Caltech GRB Team, and NASA/ESA

Hubble's Smash Hits: A collection of Hubble Space Telescope's most iconic images.

Name: Hubble Space Telescope
Type: Unspecified : Technology : Observatory : Telescope
Category: Miscellaneous
Release date: 23 April 1998, 06:00
Credit: NASA & ESA

Hubble's First Direct Look at Possible Planet Around Another Star: This NASA/ESA Hubble Telescope near-infrared image of newborn binary stars (image center) reveals a long thin nebula pointing toward a faint companion object (bottom left) which could be the first extrasolar planet to be imaged directly.

Name: IRAS 04361+2547, TMR 1
Type: Milky Way : Star
Category: Stars
Distance: 450 light years
Release date: 28 May 1998, 19:00
Credit: Susan Terebey (Extrasolar Research Corp.), and NASA/ESA