The hubble space telescope - Present and future

After fourteen years in orbit, the 'middle-aged' Hubble Space Telescope continues to play a major role in astronomical research, and is undoubtedly one of the most important and prolific space astronomy missions of all time. To do justice to the many important, exciting and fundamental discoveries made with Hubble, one would have to write a very thick book. This article is therefore intended to illustrate just a small selection of the telescope's results and to outline some of the observations planned for the near future.