Building the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (1996)

Engineers in a clean room at Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colo., work on one of Hubble's instruments, the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS), in 1996. The instrument, installed in Hubble in 1997, breaks light into colors, giving scientists an important analytical tool for studying the cosmos. STIS has been used to study such objects as black holes, new stars, and massive planets forming outside our solar system.