FOR RELEASE: 1:00 pm (EDT) May 16, 2006

Donna Weaver
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
(Phone: 410-338-4493; E-mail: dweaver@stsci.edu)

Roeland van der Marel
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
(Phone: 410-338-4931; E-mail: marel@stsci.edu)

RELEASE NO: STScI-PR06-21

ASTRONOMER WINS TOP PRIZE FOR CREATING BLACK HOLE WEB SITE

Explore the world of black holes in an award-winning Web site created by
a team led by Roeland van der Marel, an astronomer at the Space
Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md. The interactive Web site,
called "Black Holes: Gravity's Relentless Pull," rescues black holes
from the realm of science fiction and puts them back into the domain of
science. Visit the site at: http://www.hubblesite.org/go/blackholes/

The Web site won the top prize for 2005 in the Pirelli INTERNETional
Award competition, the first international multimedia contest for the
communication of science and technology on the Internet.

To see and read more about this on the Web, visit:

http://hubblesite.org/news/2006/21

http://hubblesite.org/go/blackholes/

The Hubble Space Telescope is an international cooperative project
between NASA and the European Space Agency. The Space Telescope Science
Institute in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. The Institute
is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in
Astronomy, Inc., Washington.