Nobody's Calling It a Boondoggle Now

Six months after being repaired by shuttle astronauts, the Hubble Space Telescope has beamed back a universe of information. Some of the project's major accomplishments:

--Provided images of a strange pair of Hula Hoop-like rings around a distant exploded star -- a previously unknown phenomenon.

--Took detailed photos of Pluto and its moon Charon allowing astronomers to measure their diameters precisely.

--Spotted a gigantic and unusual star that is shedding matter so furiously it will eventually vanish rather than explode and collapse into a black hole.

--Found the first definitive proof of a supermassive black hole in the core of an active galaxy.

--Confirmed the abundance of protoplanetary disks of dust surrounding nearly half the stars in the Orion Nebula , which suggests many stars in our galaxy possess planets.