NASA to donate space telescope to Caltech uni

How much more enthusiasm would you have studying at your university if you could use and control your own space telescope?

For the lucky students of Caltech, this looks like it will be their reality soon.

NASA has recently retired a little-known space telescope called the Galaxy Evolution Explorer - not surprisingly given the nickname GALEX rather than GEE! The retirement was due to funding shortfall - not its age.


The scope has apparently been doing good work studying emissions in the less-well known ultra-violet spectrum and helped confirm the nature of Dark Energy and took this remarkable picture mosaic of a red giant star called Mira leaving a trail 13 light years long through interstellar gases:

NASA is currently working on an arrangement to hand the telescope over to Caltech, and Caltech is "doing due diligence" as to whether to accept it. As if they'd knock it back??

Should ANU be putting their hands up for Hubble perhaps?