Our fair planet sports a curved, sunlit crescent against the black backdrop of space in this stunning photograph. From the unfamiliar perspective, the Earth is small and, like a telescopic image of a distant planet, the entire horizon is completely within the field of view. Enjoyed by crews on board the International Space Station, only […]
Astronauts on the space station recently enjoyed a fresh supply of leafy greens, thanks in large part to the efforts of astronaut Michael Hopkins. via NASA https://ift.tt/3eBwlts
Why is Polaris called the North Star? First, Polaris is the nearest bright star toward the north spin axis of the Earth. Therefore, as the Earth turns, stars appear to revolve around Polaris, but Polaris itself always stays in the same northerly direction — making it the North Star. Since no bright star is near […]
This image from April 24, 2021, shows the SpaceX Crew Dragon Endeavour as it approached the International Space Station. via NASA https://ift.tt/3tYhDmz
What happens if a star gets too close to a black hole? The black hole can rip it apart — but how? It’s not the high gravitational attraction itself that’s the problem — it’s the difference in gravitational pull across the star that creates the destruction. In the featured animated video illustrating this disintegration, you […]
Scientists have found fragments of titanium blasting out of a famous supernova. via NASA https://ift.tt/3epNUMI
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