In June 2021, NASA received its first sample of asteroid Ryugu, which was returned to Earth in December 2020. via NASA https://ift.tt/3jFIOQa

Observe the graceful twirl of our Solar System’s largest planet. Many interesting features of Jupiter’s enigmatic atmosphere, including dark belts and light zones, can be followed in detail. A careful inspection will reveal that different cloud layers rotate at slightly different speeds. The famous Great Red Spot is not visible at first — but soon […]

This celestial lightsaber does not lie in a galaxy far, far away, but rather inside our home galaxy, the Milky Way. via NASA https://ift.tt/3CgStnA

Does the road to our galaxy’s center go through Monument Valley? It doesn’t have to, but if your road does — take a picture. In this case, the road is US Route 163 and iconic buttes on the Navajo National Reservation populate the horizon. The band of Milky Way Galaxy stretches down from the sky […]

Halloween’s origin is ancient and astronomical. Since the fifth century BC, Halloween has been celebrated as a cross-quarter day, a day halfway between an equinox (equal day / equal night) and a solstice (minimum day / maximum night in the northern hemisphere). With a modern calendar however, even though Halloween occurs next week, the real […]

Put on your red/blue glasses and float next to asteroid 101955 Bennu. Shaped like a spinning toy top with boulders littering its rough surface, the tiny Solar System world is about one Empire State Building (less than 500 meters) across. Frames used to construct this 3D anaglyph were taken by PolyCam on the OSIRIS_REx spacecraft […]

Teams at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida lifted the Orion spacecraft and placed it atop the Space Launch System Moon rocket. via NASA https://ift.tt/2XByvEV

This pretty field of view spans over 2 degrees or 4 full moons on the sky, filled with stars toward the constellation Taurus, the Bull. Above and right of center in the frame you can spot the faint fuzzy reddish appearance of Messier 1 (M1), also known as the Crab Nebula. M1 is the first […]

The Hubble Space Telescope’s glamour shots of the universe nearly always have a discovery behind them. via NASA https://ift.tt/3E23Y2G

Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,000 light-years away toward the constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major) and covers slightly more of the sky than a Full Moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated […]