Public Outreach and Education
One of the groups at the ST-ECF was the Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre (HEIC), which, since 1999, has been the leading Hubble outreach activities group in Europe (headed by the science communication specialist Lars Lindberg Christensen and graphic designer Martin Kornmesser). HEIC's mission statement is to fulfill the Hubble Space Telescope outreach and education tasks for the European Space Agency.
HEIC became a very distinguished communication office of experts using the newest software and techniques. After the closure of ST-ECF the Outreach component continued on an ESO contract for ESA, as part of ESO's Education and Public Outreach department.
The ESA/Hubble office has produced large amounts of astronomical material - press releases, images, brochures, web pages, books etc. - suitable both for educational purposes and wider public consumption. HEIC provided a well-assorted archive that is publicly available on its web page.
The work is centred on the production of news and photo releases that highlight interesting Hubble science results and images. These are often European in origin, and so not only increase the awareness of European Space Agency’s Hubble share (15%), but the contribution of European scientists to the observatory. Furthermore the group produces video releases, innovative educational material, CD-ROMs, brochures, posters, as well as DVDs and museum information kiosks, and much more.
All publicised material can be found on spacetelescope.org. The group is home to the FITS Liberator project and the "Hubble - 15 Years of Discovery" project that also led to the book Hubble - 15 Years of Discovery.
Read more about this topic: Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility
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