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NASA has announced this is the year of the International Year of Astronomy, when Galileo used his telescope in 1609 to observe the heavens for the very first time.  With over 400 years of universe exploration and to celebrate Galileo's birthday on February 15, images are being released from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Spitzer Space Telescope across the country.

Galileo was born on the day the famous artist Michelangelo died, and from then on became a man who would make the world's first telescope in 1609 which he demonstrated to the Venetian officials. After this, he would improve his telescope until it would magnify objects a thousand times. Once he turned it to the skies, the world has never been the same since as constellations could now be seen with stars previously invisible to the naked eye---Orion could be seen with eighty stars instead of thirty-seven and the Pleiades were seen as thirty-six instead of seven---with the moon a planet of valleys and mountains. In 1610, he actually was the first person to seen four of Jupiter's moons and in July saw the ring of Saturn which he mistook for three stars. He was famous for saying, "I stayed with the Jesuit fathers. They had verified the actual existence of the new planets and had been constantly observing them for two months; we compared notes and I found that their observations agreed with my very own."

To celebrate this special year, the image of Messier 101 will be displayed by the Hubble, Spitzer, and Chandra at participating institutions with each showing a different wavelength view. For example, the Hubble view will show swirls of bright stars and glowing gas from which the Messier 101 received its name "the Pinwheel Galaxy". The infrared light image from the Spitzer views the spiral arms of the image, revealing the glow of dusty lanes where dense clouds collapse to form new stars. Meanwhile, the Chandra X-ray telescope uncovers the high-energy galaxy features—matter zooming around black holes or remnants of exploding stars. Altogether, these three views provide an excellent in-depth view for the public and astronomers to enjoy.

The images will be unveiled across the country at 76 museums, 40 schools, and universities in both small towns and big cities with celebrations being planned from February 14-28, 2009. With Astrophysics Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate supporting the image unveiling, the project is collaboration among three biggies: the Chandra X-Ray Center in Cambridge, Mass.; the Space Telescope Science Institute, and the Spitzer Science Center in Pasadena, California.  

The purpose of NASA's Science Mission Directorate is to seek and understand the origins, evolution and destiny of our universe. It engages the nation's community of scientists and sponsors scientific research, while developing and deploying satellites and probes in combination with NASA's global partners.