If the exquisite images from NASA's legendary Hubble Space Telescope seemed special, prepare for something even more stunning. The next generation of extremely large telescopes is on the way and plans for one of the biggest, the Thirty Metre Telescope, or TMT, depend on an ongoing court case over the permit needed to build it in Hawaii.
Some native people object to the TMT being constructed atop 4-kilometre-high Mauna Kea, an area they claim is sacred on Hawaii's volcano hot spot of Big Island.
Scientists are optimistic that the case will resolve and that the monster instrument, with a primary mirror at least three times the diameter of today's biggest telescopes, resulting in a nine-times-larger collecting area, will go ahead with construction.