NASA plans to order the $25 million Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) from the University of Colorado, to be installed on the Hubble Space Telescope during the fourth servicing mission scheduled to take place in late 2002.
The COS will enhance the Hubble's spectrographic capabilities at ultraviolet wavelengths and will become the "premier Hubble instrument", says Dr James Green, of the University of Colorado.
"It will allow astronomers to study the very early Universe and the creation of the heavy elements during the first period of star formation billions of years ago," Green says.
The COS will replace the Costar instrument, which was installed during the first Shuttle servicing mission in December 1993 to correct the Hubble's optical aberration. The more recent instruments for the Hubble have the correction accounted for in their design, rendering the Costar unnecessary.
The COS will be installed during the STS127/Columbia mission in August 2002.
Source: Flight International