With its new capabilities, Niedner said NASA scientists and astronomers worldwide are hoping the telescope will be able to peer back into the most distant universe.

Previously, the Hubble could look back to about 800 million years after the Big Bang, which is believed to be the cosmic explosion that marked the creation of the universe. Now Niedner said the telescope should be able to look as far back as 600 million to maybe even 500 million years after the Big Bang.

"Why is another 200 or 300 million years important? Think about the fraction. There's a lot of evolution going on in those 300 million years," he explained. "If we can see another 30% or 40% back toward the beginning, that could make a big difference in what we understand about the early universe and how things evolved."

Niedner said that point in time is critical to understand because it's believed that evolution was very rapid then.

"It's real important because we are part of that history," he added. "The Milky Way, the planet we walk on - it's [all] part of that grand history of the universe. If we really want to understand planet Earth, we have to understand it in the larger context of how stars form and solar systems form. If we want to know how stars form, we have to know a lot more about galaxies than we do. It all ties together to the very small and local to the very large and distant. We're all made of stars. The material that you and I and everyone walking this planet are made out of is all born of stars."