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Advanced Camera for Surveys
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<p>The Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) is a third-generation axial instrument aboard the <a href="/facts/Hubble_Space_Telescope/NQeIf0vw">Hubble Space Telescope</a> (HST). The initial design and scientific capabilities of ACS were defined by a team based at <a href="/facts/Johns_Hopkins_University/56US0mHw">Johns Hopkins University</a>. ACS was assembled and tested extensively at <a href="/facts/Ball_Aerospace_%2526_Technologies_Corp./uNA3asxb">Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp.</a> and the <a href="/facts/Goddard_Space_Flight_Center/WfoEKknM">Goddard Space Flight Center</a> and underwent a final flight-ready verification at the <a href="/facts/Kennedy_Space_Center/zmwszuPr">Kennedy Space Center</a> before integration in the cargo bay of the Columbia orbiter. It was launched on March 1, 2002, as part of Servicing Mission 3B (<a href="/facts/STS-109/q79uz6Ip">STS-109</a>) and installed in HST on March 7, replacing the <a href="/facts/Faint_Object_Camera/Peu8C49N">Faint Object Camera</a> (FOC), the last original instrument. ACS cost US$86 million at that time. </p><p>ACS is a highly versatile instrument that became the primary imaging instrument aboard HST. It offered several important advantages over other HST instruments: three independent, high-resolution channels covering the <a href="/facts/Ultraviolet/kncBUqn5">ultraviolet</a> to the <a href="/facts/Near-infrared/44XdJNcc">near-infrared</a> regions of the <a href="/facts/Spectrum/wPUjkpqI">spectrum</a>, a large detector area and <a href="/facts/Quantum_efficiency/MQw86Evj">quantum efficiency</a>, resulting in an increase in HST's discovery efficiency by a factor of ten, a rich complement of <a href="/facts/Filter_(optics)/WdCmGqaq">filters</a>, and <a href="/facts/Coronagraphy/ggUUrlYY">coronagraphic</a>, <a href="/facts/Polarimetry/Iu2Qg3Sb">polarimetric</a>, and <a href="/facts/Grism/7SYQXuHj">grism</a> capabilities. The observations undertaken with ACS provided astronomers with a view of the Universe with uniquely high sensitivity, as exemplified by the <a href="/facts/Hubble_Ultra-Deep_Field/wHFEJaE7">Hubble Ultra-Deep Field</a>, and encompass a wide range of astronomical phenomena, from comets and planets in the <a href="/facts/Solar_System/QIcLSazQ">Solar System</a> to the most distant <a href="/facts/Quasars/HS96328l">quasars</a> known. </p>