According to agency officials, Elon Musk's SpaceX intends to fund a research with NASA to look into how to utilise the Dragon spacecraft to increase the Hubble Space Telescope's orbital altitude, which would increase the telescope's useful life.

News reports say that in a last-minute press conference, NASA's science head Thomas Zurbuchen assured reporters that the six-month study will be completely funded by SpaceX, whose Crew Dragon spacecraft transports humans and supplies to and from the International Space Station on behalf of NASA.

"A few months ago SpaceX approached NASA with the idea for a study of how a commercial crew could help boost our Hubble spacecraft into a higher orbit, that would extend its observational lifetime."

Since its debut in 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope has served as a workhorse cosmic observatory for astronomers all over the world, providing stunning star pictures and facilitating significant discoveries like the age of the universe and the moons of Pluto.

NASA said teams will collect data to "help determine whether it would be possible to safely rendezvous, dock, and move the telescope into a more stable orbit."