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The optical designs of the HST scientific instruments

The primary optics of the Hubble Space Telescope provide a 39,000 cm2 clear light collecting area and a useful spectral bandpass ranging from 110 to at least 4,000 nm. Above the turbulence of the Earth's atmosphere, the telescope's image quality will be limited only by its 2.4 m aperture and by residual aberrations, primarily astigmatism and field curvature. On-axis point source images will achieve 60% encircled energy within a radius of 0.05 to 0.09 seconds of arc from red wavelengths to the vacuum ultraviolet.

Publish Date: 01 March 1990