The Ball State University Planetarium will be one of three local sites to unveil images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope as part of an upcoming national celebration of the orbiting observatory's 15th anniversary.

Ball State representatives will join local officials for a public unveiling of the two mural-size images at 10 a.m. April 25 at Minnetrista, 1200 N. Minnetrista Parkway.

Beverley Pitts, Ball State's provost and vice president for academic affairs, and Ron Kaitchuck, physics and astronomy professor, will participate in the ceremony. He will provide background information and host a question-and-answer session.

Ball State's Planetarium, Minnetrista and the Muncie Community Schools (MCS) Planetarium were selected to participate in the national unveiling and educational celebration. Muncie is the only city to have three institutions chosen as sites to receive a copy of the two images.

The M51 image is 4-by-6 feet, revealing striking details of how clusters of stars are born in the galaxy's long, curving spiral arms. The 3-by-6 foot photograph of the Eagle Nebula shows a gaseous landscape sculpted by ultraviolet light from a group of massive, hot, young stars. These views are among the largest and sharpest images ever taken by the Hubble telescope.

During its 15 years of viewing the universe, Hubble has taken more than 700,000 snapshots of celestial objects such as galaxies, dying stars and giant gas clouds, the birthplace of stars. The telescope gave the world a front-row seat to watch chunks of a comet slam into the giant planet Jupiter.

For more information about the Hubble images and events related to the celebration, go to the planetarium Web site or the Minnetrista Web site.