Part of a dark expanse that splits the crowded plane of our Milky Way galaxy, the Aquila Rift arcs through planet Earth’s skies near bright star Altair. In eerie silhouette against the Milky Way’s faint starlight, its dusty molecular clouds likely contain raw material to form hundreds of thousands of stars and astronomers search the […]
Our James Webb Space Telescope has captured a new image of the famous Pillars of Creation—first imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995—that reveals new details about the region. via NASA https://ift.tt/EFXP9UB
History’s first known periodic comet Halley (1P/Halley) returns to the inner Solar System every 75 years or so. The famous comet made its last appearance to the naked-eye in 1986. But dusty debris from Comet Halley can be seen raining through planet Earth’s skies twice a year during two annual meteor showers, the Eta Aquarids […]
On Oct. 13, 2022, NASA’s Lucy spacecraft captured this image of the Earth and the Moon from 890,000 miles (1.4 million km) away. via NASA https://ift.tt/lnwIbNf
On October 25th, Sun and New Moon set together as seen from Agra, India. Their close conjunction near the western horizon, a partial solar eclipse, was captured in this elevated view in hazy skies near the solitary dome of the Taj Mahal. Of course, the partial solar eclipse was also seen from most of Europe, […]
When does a nebula look like a comet? In this crowded starfield, covering over two degrees within the high flying constellation of the Swan (Cygnus), the eye is drawn to the Cocoon Nebula. A compact star forming region, the cosmic Cocoon punctuates a nebula bright in emission and reflection on the left, with a long […]
This mosaic is composed of images covering the entire sky, taken by the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) as part of WISE’s 2012 All-Sky Data Release. via NASA https://ift.tt/izNpjFd
Jupiter and its moons move like our Sun and its planets. Similarly, Jupiter spins while its moons circle around. Jupiter’s rotation can be observed by tracking circulating dark belts and light zones. The Great Red Spot, the largest storm known, rotates to become visible after about 15 seconds in the 48-second time lapse video. The […]
During its 40th close pass by Jupiter, our Juno spacecraft saw Ganymede cast a large, dark spot on the planet on Feb. 25, 2022. via NASA https://ift.tt/NVXiJ6K
What are those red clouds surrounding the Andromeda galaxy? This galaxy, M31, is often imaged by planet Earth-based astronomers. As the nearest large spiral galaxy, it is a familiar sight with dark dust lanes, bright yellowish core, and spiral arms traced by clouds of bright blue stars. A mosaic of well-exposed broad and narrow-band image […]