These three bright nebulae are often featured on telescopic tours of the constellation Sagittarius and the crowded starfields of the central Milky Way. In fact, 18th century cosmic tourist Charles Messier cataloged two of them; M8, the large nebula below and right of center, and colorful M20 near the top of the frame. The third […]
Why isn’t this ant a big sphere? Planetary nebula Mz3 is being cast off by a star similar to our Sun that is, surely, round. Why then would the gas that is streaming away create an ant-shaped nebula that is distinctly not round? Clues might include the high 1000-kilometer per second speed of the expelled […]
What’s happening in the sky? The pre-dawn sky first seemed relatively serene yesterday morning over Indian Harbor Beach in Florida, USA. But then it lit up with a rocket launch. Just to the north, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-2 Mission blasted into space aboard a powerful Falcon 9 rocket. The featured time-lapse video — compressing 12-minutes into […]
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft is seen to the right of the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington as it is launches the Crew-2 mission. via NASA https://ift.tt/32GjX5L
Recorded during 2017, timelapse sequences from the International Space Station are compiled in this serene video of planet Earth at Night. Fans of low Earth orbit can start by enjoying the view as green and red aurora borealis slather up the sky. The night scene tracks from northwest to southeast across North America, toward the […]
Sunset at Gobabeb, Namibia. via NASA https://ift.tt/3aubwPc
No sudden, sharp boundary marks the passage of day into night in this gorgeous view of ocean and clouds over our fair planet Earth. Instead, the shadow line or terminator is diffuse and shows the gradual transition to darkness we experience as twilight. With the Sun illuminating the scene from the right, the cloud tops […]
In this image that astronaut Scott Kelly posted to Twitter on Aug. 9, 2015 during his #YearInSpace captures all the the places humans dwell. via NASA https://ift.tt/3n7wEQl
When galaxies collide — what happens to their magnetic fields? To help find out, NASA pointed SOFIA, its flying 747, at galactic neighbor Centaurus A to observe the emission of polarized dust — which traces magnetic fields. Cen A’s unusual shape results from the clash of two galaxies with jets powered by gas accreting onto […]
Crew-2 are seen as they prepare to depart for Launch Complex 39A during a dress rehearsal on Sunday, April 18, 2021, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. via NASA https://ift.tt/3n51GbJ