Two of the Space Infrared Telescope Facility's components were fired up and succeeded in sending test images. The telescope requires further adjustments, however, to reach its optimum resolution within the next month, NASA said.

"We're extremely pleased, because these first images have exceeded our expectations," said Michael Werner, the SIRTF project scientist at NASA's California-based Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

The telescope, launched August 25 from Florida's Cape Canaveral, will allow scientists to study celestial objects that have gone undetected by earlier telescopes.

The 1.2-billion-dollar mission is part of a program that featured three earlier missions to study the universe with visible light, X-rays and gamma rays, using the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, according to NASA.

The launch of the telescope had originally been set for April but was repeatedly postponed due to technical problems.

Researchers will use the new equipment to study "dusty discs" around certain stars in the hope of discovering signs of life on other planets, NASA has said.

The mission is expected to take up to five years.

SPACE.WIRE