Galaxy NGC 4314 (Hubble view): This close-up view by Hubble also shows other interesting details in the galaxy's core: dust lanes, a smaller bar of stars, dust and gas embedded in the stellar ring, and an extra pair of spiral arms packed with young stars. These details make the centreresemble a miniature version of a spiral galaxy. While it is not unusual to have dust lanes and rings of gas in the centers of galaxies, it is uncommon to have spiral arms full of young stars in the cores. NGC 4314 is one of the nearest (only 40 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices) examples of a galaxy with a ring of infant stars close to the core. This stellar ring - whose radius is 1,000 light-years - is a great laboratory to study star formation in galaxies.

Name: NGC 4314
Type: Local Universe : Galaxy : Type : Spiral
Category: Galaxies
Constellation: Coma Berenices
Distance: 30 million light years
Release date: 11 June 1998, 06:00
Credit: G. Fritz Benedict, Andrew Howell, Inger Jorgensen, David Chapell (University of Texas), Jeffery Kenney (Yale University), and Beverly J. Smith (CASA, University of Colorado), and NASA/ESA .

Massive starbirth in N81: A NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope 'family portrait' of young, ultra-bright stars nested in their embryonic cloud of glowing gases. The celestial maternity ward, called N81, is located 200, 000 light-years away in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), a small irregular satellite galaxy of our Milky Way.

Name: N81
Type: Local Universe : Nebula : Type : Star Formation
Category: Nebulae
Constellation: Tucana
Distance: 200000 light years
Release date: 23 July 1998, 06:00
Credit: Mohammad Heydari-Malayeri (Paris Observatory, France), NASA/ESA

Telescopes Unveil View Of Remote, Massive Galaxy Cluster: This image, taken by the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2, shows a clearer view of the galaxies in the heart of the cluster. The width of this massive cluster is a few million light-years.

Name: MS1054-0321
Type: Unspecified : Galaxy : Grouping : Cluster
Category: CosmologyGalaxies
Constellation: Leo
Release date: 19 August 1998, 06:00
Credit: Megan Donahue (STScI)

Telescopes Unveil View Of Remote, Massive Galaxy Cluster: This image is a colour composite taken by ground-based and X-ray observatories showing the entire galaxy cluster surrounded by background and foreground galaxies. The blue colour in the center of the image represents the huge amount of hot gas that fills the space between the galaxies in the cluster. This gas - colored blue - cannot be seen in visible light, but glows in X-ray frequencies. Astronomers have measured its temperature at 300 million degrees Fahrenheit. The X-ray information was used to estimate the cluster's total mass.

Name: MS1054-0321
Type: Unspecified : Galaxy : Grouping : Cluster
Category: CosmologyGalaxies
Constellation: Leo
Release date: 19 August 1998, 06:00
Credit: Isabella Gioia (Univ. of Hawaii), and NASA/ESA

Supernova 1996cl in Distant Cluster: In March 1996, the Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 just happened to be pointed at the faraway galaxy cluster MS1054-0321 when it captured the light from an exploding star, called supernova 1996cl. The cluster is 8 billion light-years from Earth.

Name: MS1054-0321, SN 1996CL
Type: Early Universe : Star : Evolutionary Stage : Supernova
Category: CosmologyStars
Constellation: Leo
Release date: 19 August 1998, 06:00
Credit: Saul Perlmutter of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in California

A sky full of glittering jewels: The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has given us a keyhole view towards the heart of our Milky Way Galaxy, where a dazzling array of stars reside. Most of the view of our galaxy is obscured by dust. Hubble peered into the Sagittarius Star Cloud, a narrow, dust-free region, providing this spectacular glimpse of a treasure chest full of stars. Some of these gems are among the oldest inhabitants of our galaxy. By studying the older stars that pack our Milky Way's hub, scientists can learn more about the evolution of our galaxy.

Name: Milky Way, Sagittarius
Type: Milky Way : Galaxy
Category: Galaxies
Constellation: Sagittarius
Release date: 21 October 1998, 06:00
Credit: Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA/ESA)

Blowing cosmic bubbles: This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals an expanding shell of glowing gas surrounding a hot, massive star in our Milky Way Galaxy. The shell is being shaped by strong stellar winds of material and radiation produced by the bright star at the left, which is 10 to 20 times more massive than our Sun.

Name: Bubble Nebula, NGC 7635
Type: Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Emission : H II Region
Category: Nebulae
Constellation: Cassiopeia
Distance: 8000 light years
Release date: 21 October 1998, 06:00
Credit: Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA/ESA)

Hubble Deep Field in Infrared: A NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope view of the faintest galaxies ever seen in the universe, taken in infrared light with the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer(NICMOS). The picture contains over 300 galaxies having spiral, elliptical and irregular shapes. Though most of these galaxies were first seen in 1995 when Hubble was used to take a visible-light deep exposure of the same field, NICMOS uncovers many new objects. Most of these objects are too small and faint to be apparent in the full field NICMOS view.

Name: HDF, Hubble Deep Field
Type: Unspecified : Galaxy
Category: CosmologyGalaxies
Constellation: Ursa Major
Release date: 8 October 1998, 17:00
Credit: Rodger I. Thompson (University of Arizona), and NASA/ESA

Great Balls of Fire! Hubble Sees Bright Knots Ejected from Brilliant Star: Resembling an aerial fireworks explosion, this dramatic NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope picture of the energetic star WR124 reveals it is surrounded by hot clumps of gas being ejected into space at speeds of over 100, 000 miles per hour (approx. 45 kilometres per second).

Name: Merril's Star, WR 124
Type: Milky Way : Star : Type : Wolf-RayetMilky Way : Nebula
Category: Stars
Constellation: Sagitta
Distance: 10000 light years
Release date: 5 November 1998, 15:00
Credit: Yves Grosdidier (University of Montreal and Observatoire de Strasbourg), Anthony Moffat (Universitie de Montreal), Gilles Joncas(Universite Laval), Agnes Acker (Observatoire de Strasbourg), and NASA/ESA

A glowing pool of light: NGC 3132 is a striking example of a planetary nebula. This expanding cloud of gas, surrounding a dying star, is known to amateur astronomers in the southern hemisphere as the 'Eight-Burst' or the 'Southern Ring' Nebula.

Name: NGC 3132, Southern Ring Nebula
Type: Milky Way : Nebula : Type : Planetary
Category: Nebulae
Constellation: Vela
Distance: 2000 light years
Release date: 5 November 1998, 18:00
Credit: Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA/NASA/ESA)

Hubble Deep Field South Unveils Myriad Galaxies: A NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope view down a 12 billion light-year long corridor of space loaded with a dazzling assortment of thousands of never-before seen galaxies.

Name: HDF-S, Hubble Deep Field South
Type: Early Universe : Cosmology : Morphology : Deep Field
Category: Cosmology
Constellation: Tucana
Release date: 23 November 1998, 21:00
Credit: R. Williams (STScI), the HDF-S Team, and NASA/ESA