The Hubble Space Telescope has a camera that captures at 800 by 800 pixels, and stiches the images together to create 650 megapixel photos.
Though the Hubble is great as it is, there is definitely room for improvement. While we're waiting for the James Webb Telescope (to be launched in 2013), why not scrape out Hubble's aging camera and throw in a nice system developed by Canon (who manufactured the Hubble's lens) and Gigipan (who makes robotic camera mounts)?
If we can get 1.5 gigapixels out of a camera as cheap as $200 and a Gigapan Imager that goes for $300, why can't be just go in and spend a week replacing the delapidated camera with a customized solution based off of these fairly cheap consumer products? Such equipment optimized for the Hubble Space Telescope's beastly zoom lens seems plausible.
You'd have to train the astronauts to do it. Then run simulations over and over and over. Then you'd have to design a capsule that could dock to Hubble and also sustain life for the week or two it takes to replace it. Then you'd have to get funding for said capsule, plus the entire project in general. By the time you got up there to finally change the camera, it would be 2013 already.
I know NASA is incompetent, but surely they can get $100,000 in equipment up within six months for about ten million dollars. They already have the setup for a mission like that stored away.
