spacetoday.net: NASA renames GLAST, releases first images

NASA renames GLAST, releases first images

Posted: Thu, Aug 28, 2008, 12:06 AM ET (0406 GMT)
First image from GLAST/Fermi (NASA)

NASA announced this week a new name for a recently-launched gamma-ray telescope as well as the first images returned by the spacecraft. The Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) was launched in June and placed into Earth orbit to perform observations of gamma-ray sources from throughout the universe. The spacecraft will now be known as the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope after famed physicist Enrico Fermi. NASA also released this week the first images taken by Fermi, including an all-sky view that shows the Milky Way and more distant objects. A separate instrument on Fermi designed to detect gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) detected 31 such bursts in its first month of operations.