The Crew Module Test Article, a full-scale mockup of NASA’s Orion spacecraft, is seen in the waters of the Pacific Ocean on July 26, 2023. via NASA https://ift.tt/klTRVEJ

Why is Phobos so dark? Phobos, the largest and innermost of the two Martian moons, is the darkest moon in the entire Solar System. Its unusual orbit and color indicate that it may be a captured asteroid composed of a mixture of ice and dark rock. The featured assigned-color picture of Phobos near the edge […]

Admire the beauty but fear the beast. The beauty is the aurora overhead, here taking the form of a great green spiral, seen between picturesque clouds with the bright Moon to the side and stars in the background. The beast is the wave of charged particles that creates the aurora but might, one day, impair […]

Bright sunlight glints as long dark shadows mark this image of the surface of the Moon. It was taken fifty-four years ago, July 20, 1969, by Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first to walk on the lunar surface. Pictured is the mission’s lunar module, the Eagle, and spacesuited lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin. Aldrin […]

The tranquil spiral galaxy UGC 12295 basks leisurely in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. via NASA https://ift.tt/Rg6vfPt

High-speed outflows of molecular gas from a pair of actively forming young stars shine in infrared light, revealing themselves in this NIRcam image from the James Webb Space Telescope. Cataloged as HH (Herbig-Haro) 46/47, the young stars are lodged within a dark nebula that is largely opaque when viewed in visible light. The pair lie […]

NASA Student Airborne Research Program (SARP) interns Dorothy Sue Grimmer and Victoria Tran pose for a photo in front of the Dynamic Aviation B200 ahead of their morning research flight on Tuesday, June 13, 2023. via NASA https://ift.tt/jnxML53

Large galaxies grow by eating small ones. Even our own galaxy engages in a sort of galactic cannibalism, absorbing small galaxies that are too close and are captured by the Milky Way’s gravity. In fact, the practice is common in the universe and illustrated by this striking pair of interacting galaxies from the banks of […]

Woody Hoburg took this photo of Laguna Verde’s inviting waters as the International Space Station orbited 264 miles (425 km) over South America on July 7, 2023. via NASA https://ift.tt/9L35r4b

South of Antares, in the tail of the nebula-rich constellation Scorpius, lies emission nebula IC 4628. Nearby hot, massive stars, millions of years young, irradiate the nebula with invisible ultraviolet light, stripping electrons from atoms. The electrons eventually recombine with the atoms to produce the visible nebular glow, dominated by the red emission of hydrogen. […]