How often do look up on the sky? No, not for the weather verification, to check if the rain should be expected, but just because. What was the last time you looked at the stars? Probably, long ago, in your childhood...

Get ready, gray-haired romantics and all inquisitive users of the Internet and computers. You will be delighted with the new utility developed by Microscope. Worldwide Telescope (WWT) is the virtual telescope, offering surprisingly real pictures of space based on the collection of images collected by different world-wide observatories and also by space telescope Hubble. The project development took long 16 years of the critical scientific research. In the memory of Jim Gray, the authors of the Microsoft Research project announced that the utility is absolutely free for all users.

WWT users are able to "travel" throughout the galaxy, closely viewing the planets of our solar system from different perspectives and observing its structures in the X-ray spectrum. Or, if you prefer to inspect your Mother Earth, you can take on its surface by the eyes of astronauts, or study the panorama of another city, seen from space.

At present, the software is supported exclusively by Windows XP and Windows Vista Operating Systems. Mac users might use it with loading multi-system load utility BootCamp.

Earlier, at the end of August 2007, a similar service was launched by Google. With Google Sky, add-on to the famous Good Earth, you are able to examine the images of the celestial sphere. However, to be fair, the Microsoft creation - WWT- appears to be of better designed and carries higher informative value. It is definitely recommended for everybody who is not yet gave up the beauty of Universe under the load of the day-to-day life routine!!!

Home page of project and link for the software downloading:

http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/

Project was presented for the first time by astrophysicist and science populariser Roy Gould in March 2008. Review his video presentation of the project: