diff --git "a/nasascraper_data.csv" "b/nasascraper_data.csv" --- "a/nasascraper_data.csv" +++ "b/nasascraper_data.csv" @@ -1,71 +1,71 @@ title,description,date,data_type,source,scrape_timestamp -Star Trails and Tajinastes,"What bizarre planet do these alien creatures inhabit? It's only planet Earth, of course. In this well-composed scene, the sky is filled with star trails around the north celestial pole. A reflection of the Earth's daily rotation on its axis, star trails are familiar to photographers who fix their camera to a tripod and make long exposures of the night sky. But the imposing forms gazing skyward probably look strange to many denizens of Earth. Found on the Canary Island of Tenerife, they are red tajinastes, rare flowering plants that grow to a height of up to 3 meters. Hidden among the rocks of the volcanic terrain, tajinastes bloom in spring and early summer and then die after their seeds mature. On the distant horizon, below and left of the celestial pole, lies the Teide volcano.",2010-06-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -"Island Universe, Cosmic Sand","On August 13, while counting Perseid meteors under dark, early morning Arizona skies, Rick Scott set out to photograph their fleeting but fiery trails. The equipment he used included a telephoto lens and fast color film. After 21 pictures he'd caught only two meteors, but luckily this was one of them. Tracking the sky, his ten minute long exposure shows a field of many stars in our own Milky Way galaxy, most too faint to be seen by the unaided eye. Flashing from lower left to upper right, the bright meteor would have been an easy eyeful though, as friction with Earth's atmosphere vaporized the hurtling grain of cosmic sand, a piece of dust from Comet Swift-Tuttle. Just above and left of center, well beyond the stars of the Milky Way, lies the island universe known as M31 or the Andromeda galaxy. The visible meteor trail begins about 100 kilometers above Earth's surface, one of the closest celestial objects seen in the sky. In contrast, Andromeda, about 2 million light-years away, is the most distant object easily visible to the naked-eye.",2002-08-23,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Ice Clouds over a Red Planet,"If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see? You might look out over a vast orange landscape covered with rocks under a dusty orange sky, with a blue-tinted Sun over the horizon, and odd-shaped water clouds hovering high overhead. This was just the view captured last March by NASA's rolling explorer, Perseverance. The orange coloring is caused by rusted iron in the Martian dirt, some of which is small enough to be swept up by winds into the atmosphere. The blue tint near the rising Sun is caused by blue light being preferentially scattered out from the Sun by the floating dust. The light-colored clouds on the right are likely composed of water-ice and appear high in the Martian atmosphere. The shapes of some of these clouds are unusual for Earth and remain a topic of research.",2024-12-03,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The 2MASS Galaxy Sky,"Are the nearest galaxies distributed randomly? A plot of over one million of the brightest ""extended sources"" detected by the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) shows that they are not. The vast majority of these infrared extended sources are galaxies. Visible above is an incredible tapestry of structure that provides limits on how the universe formed and evolved. Many galaxies are gravitationally bound together to form clusters, which themselves are loosely bound into superclusters, which in turn are sometimes seen to align over even larger scale structures. In contrast, very bright stars inside our own Milky Way Galaxy cause the vertical blue sash.",2005-06-26,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Giant Storm Systems Battle on Jupiter,"Two of the largest storm systems on Jupiter are colliding, and nobody is sure what will result. The larger storm is the famous Great Red Spot, while the smaller is a large white oval. Both are swirling cloud systems that circulate on Jupiter. The white oval is part of a belt of clouds that circles Jupiter faster than the Great Red Spot. The oval started being slowed by the Great Red Spot two weeks ago and the collision could last another month. The oval will likely survive but could possibly be disrupted or absorbed. The two storm systems went at it at least once before in 1975 causing the Spot's red color to fade for several years. The passing Voyager 2 robot spacecraft took the above picture of Jupiter's Great Red Spot in 1979. A different white oval was then visible below the Spot.",2002-02-05,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Virgo Cluster of Galaxies,"Pictured are several galaxies of the Virgo Cluster, the closest cluster of galaxies to our Milky Way Galaxy. The Virgo Cluster spans more than 5 degrees on the sky - about 10 times the angle made by a full Moon. It contains over 100 galaxies of many types - including spirals, ellipticals, and irregular galaxies. The Virgo Cluster is so massive that it is noticeably pulling our Galaxy toward it. The cluster contains not only galaxies filled with stars but also gas so hot it glows in X-rays. Motions of galaxies in and around clusters indicate that they contain more dark matter than any visible matter we can see. Notable bright galaxies in the Virgo Cluster include bright Messier objects such as M61, M87, M90, and M100.",2000-02-20,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Blue Sun Bristling,"Our Sun may look like all soft and fluffy, but it's not. Our Sun is an extremely large ball of bubbling hot gas, mostly hydrogen gas. The above picture of our Sun was taken last month in a specific red color of light emitted by hydrogen gas called Hydrogen-alpha and then color inverted to appear blue. In this light, details of the Sun's chromosphere are particularly visible, highlighting numerous thin tubes of magnetically-confined hot gas known as spicules rising from the Sun like bristles from a shag carpet. Our Sun glows because it is hot, but it is not on fire. Fire is the rapid acquisition of oxygen, and there is very little oxygen on the Sun. The energy source of our Sun is the nuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium deep within its core. No sunspots or large active regions were visible on the Sun this day, although some solar prominences are visible around the edges.",2009-11-04,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Star Trails Over Oregon,"As the Earth spins on its axis, the sky seems to rotate around us. This motion, called diurnal motion, produces the beautiful concentric trails traced by stars during time exposures. Partial-circle star trails are pictured above over Grants Pass, Oregon, USA last month. Near the middle of the circles is the North Celestial Pole (NCP), easily identified as the point in the sky at the center of all the star trail arcs. The star Polaris, commonly known as the North Star, made the very short bright circle near the NCP. About 12,000 years ago, the bright star Vega was the North Star, and in about 14,000 years, as the Earth's spin axis slowly continues to precess, Vega will become the North Star again.",2009-09-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Center of Centaurus A,"A fantastic jumble of young blue star clusters, gigantic glowing gas clouds, and imposing dark dust lanes surrounds the central region of the active galaxy Centaurus A. This mosaic of Hubble Space Telescope images taken in blue, green, and red light has been processed to present a natural color picture of this cosmic maelstrom. Infrared images from the Hubble have also shown that hidden at the center of this activity are what seem to be disks of matter spiraling into a black hole with a billion times the mass of the Sun! Centaurus A itself is apparently the result of a collision of two galaxies and the left over debris is steadily being consumed by the black hole. Astronomers believe that such black hole ""central engines"" generate the radio, X-ray, and gamma-ray energy radiated by Centaurus A and other active galaxies. But for an active galaxy Centaurus A is close, a mere 10 million light-years away, and is a relatively convenient laboratory for exploring these powerful sources of energy.",1998-05-22,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -NGC 7023: The Iris Nebula,"Like delicate cosmic petals, these clouds of interstellar dust and gas have blossomed 1,300 light-years away in the fertile star fields of the constellation Cepheus. Sometimes called the Iris Nebula and dutifully cataloged as NGC 7023, this is not the only nebula in the sky to evoke the imagery of flowers. Still, the beautiful digital image shows off the Iris Nebula's range of colors and symmetries in impressive detail. Within the Iris, dusty nebular material surrounds a massive, hot, young star in its formative years. Central filaments of cosmic dust glow with a reddish photoluminesence as some dust grains effectively convert the star's invisible ultraviolet radiation to visible red light. Yet the dominant color of the nebula is blue, characteristic of dust grains reflecting starlight. Dark, obscuring clouds of dust and cold molecular gas are also present and can lead the eye to see other convoluted and fantastic shapes. Infrared observations indicate that this nebula may contain complex carbon molecules known as PAHs. As shown here, the Iris Nebula is about 6 light-years across.",2004-11-04,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Doomed Star Eta Carinae,"Carinae may be about to explode. But no one knows when - it may be next year, it may be one million years from now. Eta Carinae's mass - about 100 times greater than our Sun - makes it an excellent candidate for a full blown supernova. Historical records do show that about 150 years ago Eta Carinae underwent an unusual outburst that made it one of the brightest stars in the southern sky. Eta Carinae, in the Keyhole Nebula, is the only star currently thought to emit natural LASER light. This image, taken in 1996, resulted from sophisticated image-processing procedures designed to bring out new details in the unusual nebula that surrounds this rogue star. Now clearly visible are two distinct lobes, a hot central region, and strange radial streaks. The lobes are filled with lanes of gas and dust which absorb the blue and ultraviolet light emitted near the center. The streaks remain unexplained. Will these clues tell us how the nebula was formed? Will they better indicate when Eta Carinae will explode?",2000-08-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Creature Aurora Over Norway,"It was Halloween and the sky looked like a creature. Exactly which creature, the astrophotographer was unsure but (possibly you can suggest one). Exactly what caused this eerie apparition in 2013 was sure: one of the best auroral displays in recent years. This spectacular aurora had an unusually high degree of detail. Pictured here, the vivid green and purple auroral colors are caused by high atmospheric oxygen and nitrogen reacting to a burst of incoming electrons. Birch trees in Troms�, Norway formed an also eerie foreground. Recently, new photogenic auroras have accompanied new geomagnetic storms.",2018-11-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Snows of Paranal,"Recorded last week, this dawn portrait of snowy mountain and starry sky captures a very rare scenario. The view does feature a pristine sky above the 2,600 meter high mountain Cerro Paranal, but clear skies over Paranal are not at all unusual. That's one reason the mountain is home to the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope. Considering the number of satellites now in orbit, the near sunrise streak of a satellite glinting at the upper left isn't rare either. And the long, bright trail of a meteor can often be spotted this time of year too. The one at the far right is associated with the annual Perseid meteor shower whose peak is expected tomorrow (Friday, August 12). In fact, the rarest aspect of the picture is just the snow. Cerro Paranal rises above South America's Atacama desert, known as the driest place on planet Earth.",2011-08-11,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Moons and Rings Before Saturn,"While cruising around Saturn, be on the lookout for picturesque juxtapositions of moons and rings. Another striking alignment occurred last March in the view of humanity's Saturn-orbiting Cassini spacecraft. Rhea, one of Saturn's larger moons, was caught passing Epimetheus, one of Saturn's smaller moons. Epimetheus, as pictured above, is actually well behind the heavily cratered Rhea. Further back, several of the complex rings of Saturn can be seen crossing the image horizontally. Behind both the moons and rings is giant Saturn itself, showing expansive but featureless clouds in the green light where the above image was taken. The Cassini mission around Saturn has now been extended to 2017 to better study the complex planetary system as its season changes from equinox to solstice.",2010-05-31,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Orbiting a Black Hole,"What would it look like to orbit a black hole? Since the strong gravity of the black hole can significantly alter light paths, conditions would indeed look strange. For one thing, the entire sky would be visible, since even stars behind the black hole would have their light bent to the observer's eye. For another, the sky near the black hole would appear significantly distorted, with more and more images of the entire sky visible increasingly near the black hole. Most visually striking, perhaps, is the outermost sky image completely contained inside an easily discernible circle known as the Einstein ring. Orbiting a black hole, as shown in the above scientifically-accurate computer-created illustrative video, will show stars that pass nearly directly behind the black hole as zipping around rapidly near the Einstein ring. Although star images near the Einstein ring may appear to move faster than light, no star is actually moving that quickly. The above video is part of a sequence of videos visually exploring the space near a black hole's event horizon. (Disclosure: Video creator Robert Nemiroff is an editor for APOD.)",2013-07-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Ninety Gravitational Wave Spectrograms and Counting,"very time two massive black holes collide, a loud chirping sound is broadcast out into the universe in gravitational waves. Humanity has only had the technology to hear these unusual chirps for the past seven years, but since then we have heard about 90 -- during the first three observing runs. Featured above are the spectrograms -- plots of gravitational-wave frequency versus time -- of these 90 as detected by the giant detectors of LIGO (in the USA), VIRGO (in Europe), and KAGRA (in Japan). The more energy received on Earth from a collision, the brighter it appears on the graphic. Among many science firsts, these gravitational-radiation chirps are giving humanity an unprecedented inventory of black holes and neutron stars, and a new way to measure the expansion rate of our universe. A fourth gravitational wave observing run with increased sensitivity is currently planned to begin in 2022 December.",2021-12-07,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -A High Energy Fleet,"Looking like a fleet of futuristic starcruisers, NASA's highly successful series of High Energy Astrophysical Observatory (HEAO) spacecraft appear poised over planet Earth. Labeled A, B, and C in this vintage illustration, the spacebased telescopes were known as HEAO-1, HEAO-2, and HEAO-3 respectively. HEAO-1 and HEAO-2 were responsible for revealing to earthlings the wonders of the x-ray sky, discovering 1,000s of celestial sources of high-energy radiation. HEAO-2, also known as the Einstein Observatory, was launched near the date of the famous physicist's 100th birthday (November, 1978) and was the first large, fully imaging x-ray telescope in space. HEAO-3, the last in the series, was launched in 1979 and measured high energy cosmic-ray particles and gamma-rays. These satellite observatories were roughly 18 feet long and weighed about 7,000 pounds. Their missions completed, all have fallen from orbit and burned up harmessly in the atmosphere.",1998-05-24,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Stars and Dust Across Corona Australis,"Cosmic dust clouds sprawl across a rich field of stars in this sweeping telescopic vista near the northern boundary of Corona Australis, the Southern Crown. Probably less than 500 light-years away and effectively blocking light from more distant, background stars in the Milky Way, the densest part of the dust cloud is about 8 light-years long. At its tip (upper right) is a group of lovely reflection nebulae cataloged as NGC 6726, 6727, 6729, and IC 4812. A characteristic blue color is produced as light from hot stars is reflected by the cosmic dust. The smaller yellowish nebula (NGC 6729) surrounds young variable star R Coronae Australis. Magnificent globular star cluster NGC 6723 is toward the upper right corner of the view. While NGC 6723 appears to be part of the group, it actually lies nearly 30,000 light-years away, far beyond the Corona Australis dust clouds.",2012-09-27,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Near Infrared Sky,"Was this picture taken from outside our Galaxy? No, it is a composite taken from Earth orbit, well inside our Milky Way Galaxy. In light just a little too red for human eyes to see - ""near infrared"" electromagnetic radiation - the disk and center of our Galaxy stand out giving an appearance likely similar to seeing our Galaxy from the outside in visible light. The above COBE image was recently reprocessed for higher resolution and shows red stars and dust in our Galaxy superposed against the faint glow of many dim stars in distant galaxies. Faintly visible as an S-shaped sash running through the image center is zodiacal light -- dust in our own Solar System. Compared to the far-infrared sky, little Galactic dust is visible. The two smudges on the lower right are the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds neighboring galaxies.",2000-05-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Moon AND Sun,"This composite image was made from 22 separate pictures of the Moon and Sun all taken from Chisamba, Zambia during the total phase of the 2001 June 21 solar eclipse. The multiple exposures were digitally processed and combined to simultaneously show a wealth of detail which no single camera exposure or naked-eye observation could easily reveal. Most striking are the incredible flowing streamers of the Sun's outer atmosphere or solar corona, notoriously difficult to see except when the new Moon blocks the bright solar disk. Features on the darkened near side of the Moon can also be made out, illuminated by sunlight reflected from a full Earth. A giant solar prominence seems to hang just beyond the Moon's eastern (left) edge while about one diameter farther east of the eclipsed Sun is the relatively faint (4th magnitude) star 1 Geminorum. The still active Sun will be totally eclipsed by the Moon tomorrow, but the path of the total eclipse will mostly cross the relatively inaccessible continent of Antarctica.",2003-11-22,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -El Niño Water Rhythm,"This year's El Niño is the strongest ever recorded. The large amount of warm water in the Pacific Ocean near the equator is causing unusual weather all over planet Earth. The above false-color images of Earth show the relative levels of warm water between normal (upper left) and the comparatively mild El Niño of 1995 - 1996. Red indicates a high water level. Detailed measurements of this years El Niño indicate the warm water level is rising and falling in rhythmic fashion, possibly in response to changing wind patterns.",1998-01-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -"Fox Fur, Unicorn, and Christmas Tree","Clouds of glowing hydrogen gas fill this colorful skyscape in the faint but fanciful constellation Monoceros, the Unicorn. A star forming region cataloged as NGC 2264, the complex jumble of cosmic gas and dust is about 2,700 light-years distant and mixes reddish emission nebulae excited by energetic light from newborn stars with dark interstellar dust clouds. Where the otherwise obscuring dust clouds lie close to the hot, young stars they also reflect starlight, forming blue reflection nebulae. The telescopic image spans about 3/4 degree or nearly 1.5 full moons, covering 40 light-years at the distance of NGC 2264. Its cast of cosmic characters includes the the Fox Fur Nebula, whose dusty, convoluted pelt lies near the top, bright variable star S Monocerotis immersed in the blue-tinted haze near center, and the Cone Nebula pointing in from the right side of the frame. Of course, the stars of NGC 2264 are also known as the Christmas Tree star cluster. The triangular tree shape is seen on its side here. Traced by brighter stars it has its apex at the Cone Nebula. The tree's broader base is centered near S Monocerotis.",2019-02-07,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -TT Cygni: Carbon Star,"TT Cygni is a cool red giant star with a wind. This false-color picture of TT Cyg was made using a coordinated array of millimeter wavelength radio telescopes and shows radio emission from carbon monoxide (CO) molecules in the surrounding gas. The central emission is from material blown off the red giant over a few hundred years while the thin ring, with a radius of about 1/4 light-year, actually represents a shell of gas expanding outward for 6,000 years. Carbon stars like TT Cyg are so named for their apparent abundance of carbon containing molecules. The carbon is likely the dredged-up ashes of nuclear helium burning in the stellar interior. Carbon stars loose a significant fraction of their total mass in the form of a stellar wind which ultimately enriches the interstellar gas - the source of material for future generations of stars. TT Cyg is about 1,500 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus.",1998-12-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Bright Spiral Galaxy M81,"One of the brightest galaxies in planet Earth's sky is similar in size to our Milky Way Galaxy: big, beautiful M81. The grand spiral galaxy can be found toward the northern constellation of the Great Bear (Ursa Major). This superbly detailed image reveals M81's bright yellow nucleus, blue spiral arms, tell tale pinkish star forming regions, and sweeping cosmic dust lanes with a scale comparable to the Milky Way. Hinting at a disorderly past, a remarkable dust lane actually runs straight through the disk, to the left of the galactic center, contrary to M81's other prominent spiral features. The errant dust lane may be the lingering result of a close encounter between between M81 and its smaller companion galaxy, M82. Scrutiny of variable stars in M81 has yielded one of the best determined distances for an external galaxy -- 11.8 million light-years. M81's dwarf companion galaxy Holmberg IX can be seen just above the large spiral.",2015-10-17,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Jupiter and Venus Converge over Germany,"This was a sky to show the kids. Early this month the two brightest planets in the night sky, Jupiter and Venus, appeared to converge. At their closest, the two planets were separated by only about the angular width of the full moon. The spectacle occurred just after sunset and was seen and photographed all across planet Earth. The displayed image was taken near to the time of closest approach from Wiltingen, Germany, and features the astrophotographer, spouse, and their two children. Of course, Venus remains much closer to both the Sun and the Earth than Jupiter -- the apparent closeness between the planets in the sky of Earth was only angular. Jupiter and Venus have passed and now appear increasingly far apart. Similar planetary convergence opportunities will eventually arise. In a few months, for example, Mars and Venus will appear to congregate just as the Sun sets. Jupiter & Venus Conjunction Gallery: Notable Submissions to APOD",2023-03-15,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -La Silla Eclipse Sequence,"The road to the high mountaintop La Silla Observatory in the Chilean Atacama Desert also led in to the path of July 2nd's total solar eclipse. Recorded at regular intervals before and after the total eclipse phase, the frames in this composite sequence include the moment the Moon's dark shadow fell across some of planet Earth's advanced large telescopes. The dreamlike view looks west toward the setting Sun and the approaching Moon shadow. In fact La Silla was a little north of the shadow track's center line, so the region's stunning, clear skies are slightly brighter to the north (right) in the scene.",2019-07-05,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Central IC 1805,"Cosmic clouds seem to form fantastic shapes in the central regions of emission nebula IC 1805. Of course, the clouds are sculpted by stellar winds and radiation from massive hot stars in the nebula's newborn star cluster (aka Melotte 15). About 1.5 million years young, the cluster stars appear on the right in this colorful skyscape, along with dark dust clouds silhouetted against glowing atomic gas. A composite of narrow and broad band telescopic images, the view spans about 15 light-years and includes emission from hydrogen in green, sulfur in red, and oxygen in blue hues. Wider field images reveal that IC 1805's simpler, overall outline suggests its popular name - The Heart Nebula. IC 1805 is located about 7,500 light years away toward the constellation Cassiopeia.",2008-07-26,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -21st Century M101,"One of the last entries in Charles Messier's famous catalog, big, beautiful spiral galaxy M101 is definitely not one of the least. About 170,000 light-years across, this galaxy is enormous, almost twice the size of our own Milky Way Galaxy. M101 was also one of the original spiral nebulae observed with Lord Rosse's large 19th century telescope, the Leviathan of Parsontown. In contrast, this multiwavelength view of the large island universe is a composite of images recorded by space-based telescopes in the 21st century. Color coded from X-rays to infrared wavelengths (high to low energies), the image data was taken from the Chandra X-ray Observatory (purple), the Galaxy Evolution Explorer ( blue), Hubble Space Telescope(yellow), and the Spitzer Space Telescope(red). While the X-ray data trace the location of multimillion degree gas around M101's exploded stars and neutron star and black hole binary star systems, the lower energy data follow the stars and dust that define M101's grand spiral arms. Also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101 lies within the boundaries of the northern constellation Ursa Major, about 25 million light-years away.",2012-07-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Damage to Apollo 13,"July 8, 1995 Damage to Apollo 13 Picture Credit: NASA, Crew of Apollo 13 Explanation: In April of 1970, after an oxygen tank exploded and damaged their service module, the Apollo 13 astronauts were forced to abandon their plans to make the third manned lunar landing. The extent of the damage is revealed in this photo, taken as the crippled module was drifting away - jettisoned prior to their reentry and eventual safe splashdown. An entire panel on the right side of the module is seen to have been blown away and damage to internal structures is apparent. For more information about the picture see the NASA photo caption. We keep an archive of Astronomy Pictures of the Day. Astronomy Picture of the Day is brought to you by Robert Nemiroff and Jerry Bonnell . Original material on this page is copyrighted to Robert J. Nemiroff and Jerry T. Bonnell.",1995-07-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -"Dust, Gas, and Stars in the Orion Nebula","The Great Nebula in Orion, an immense, nearby starbirth region, is probably the most famous of all astronomical nebulas. Here, filaments of dark dust and glowing gas surround hot young stars at the edge of an immense interstellar molecular cloud only 1500 light-years away. In the featured deep image shown in assigned colors, part of the nebula's center is shown as taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. The Great Nebula in Orion can be found with the unaided eye near the easily identifiable belt of three stars in the popular constellation Orion. In addition to housing a bright open cluster of stars known as the Trapezium, the Orion Nebula contains many stellar nurseries. These nurseries contain much hydrogen gas, hot young stars, proplyds, and stellar jets spewing material at high speeds. Also known as M42 and M43, the Orion Nebula spans about 40 light years and is located in the same spiral arm of our Galaxy as the Sun.",2017-03-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Hydra Cluster of Galaxies,"You are flying through space and come to ... the Hydra Cluster of Galaxies. Listed as Abell 1060, the Hydra Cluster contains well over 100 bright galaxies. Clusters of galaxies are the largest gravitationally-bound objects in the universe. All of the bright extended images in the above picture are galaxies in the Hydra Cluster with the exception of unrelated diffraction crosses centered on bright stars. Several proximate clusters and galaxy groups might together create an even larger entity - a supercluster - but these clumps of matter are not (yet) falling toward each other. In fact, the Hydra cluster is thought to be part of the Hydra-Centaurus Supercluster of galaxies. Similarly, our own Milky Way Galaxy is part of the Local Group of Galaxies which is part of the Virgo Supercluster of Galaxies.",1997-08-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Pluto Not Yet Explored,"Cold, distant, Pluto is the only planet in our Solar System which has not been visited by a spacecraft from Earth. The story goes that the legend ""Pluto Not Yet Explored"" on a US postal stamp depicting the tiny, mysterious world inspired a JPL employee to develop plans for a Pluto flyby. These plans evolved into the current ""Pluto Express"" mission intended for launch early in the next decade. The type of small, high-tech spacecraft proposed is depicted above in an artist's vision approaching Pluto's mottled surface. A tenuous, transient atmosphere is visible as blue haze beyond the bright limb while Pluto's companion Charon looms in the distance. Images and data from such a mission would be an incredible boon to those studying these bizarre, inaccessible worlds as evidence mounts that Pluto itself is only the largest of many small ice dwarf mini-planets. Some have dubbed the yet unexplored Pluto-Charon system the last ""astronomers' planet"". Note: Pluto's discoverer, astronomer Clyde Tombaugh, celebrated his 90th birthday on February 4.",1996-02-12,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Little Planet Aurora,"Immersed in an eerie greenish light, this rugged little planet appears to be home to stunning water falls and an impossibly tall mountain. It's planet Earth of course. On the night of November 9 the nadir-centered 360 degree mosaic was captured by digital camera from the Kirkjufell mountain area of western Iceland. Curtains of shimmering Aurora Borealis or Northern Lights provide the pale greenish illumination. The intense auroral display was caused by solar activity that rocked Earth's magnetosphere in early November and produced strong geomagnetic storms. Kirkjufell mountain itself stands at the top of the stereographic projection's circular horizon. Northern hemisphere skygazers will recognize the familiar stars of the Big Dipper just above Kirkjufell's peak. At lower right the compact Pleiades star cluster and truly giant planet Jupiter also shine in this little planet's night sky.",2023-11-25,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Muon Wobble Possible Door to Supersymmetric Universe,"How fast do fundamental particles wobble? A surprising answer to this seemingly inconsequential question has come out of Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York, USA and may not only indicate that the Standard Model of Particle Physics is incomplete but also that our universe is filled with a previously undetected type of fundamental particle. Specifically, the muon, a particle with similarities to a heavy electron, has had its relatively large wobble under scrutiny since 1999 in an experiment known as g-2 (gee-minus-two), pictured above. The result has galvanized other experimental groups around the world to confirm it, and pressures theorists to better understand it. The rate of wobble is sensitive to a strange sea of virtual particles that pop into and out of existence everywhere. The unexpected wobble rate may indicate that this sea houses virtual particles that include nearly invisible supersymmetric counterparts to known particles. If so, a nearly invisible universe of real supersymmetric particles might exist all around us.",2005-08-28,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Hickson Compact Group 90,"Scanning the skies for galaxies, Canadian astronomer Paul Hickson and colleagues identified some 100 compact groups of galaxies, now appropriately called Hickson Compact Groups (HCGs). This sharp Hubble image shows one such galaxy group, HCG 90, in startling detail. Three galaxies are revealed to be strongly interacting: a dusty spiral galaxy stretched and distorted between a pair of large elliptical galaxies. The close encounter will trigger furious star formation. On a cosmic timescale, the gravitational tug of war will eventually result in the merger of the trio into a large single galaxy. The merger process is now understood to be a normal part of the evolution of galaxies, including our own Milky Way. HCG 90 lies about 100 million light-years away in the constellation Piscis Austrinus. This Hubble view spans about 80,000 light-years at that estimated distance. Of course, Hickson Compact Groups also make for rewarding viewing for Earth-bound astronomers with more modest sized telescopes.",2009-03-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Tagging Bennu: The Movie,"This is what it looks like to punch an asteroid. Last month, NASA's robotic spacecraft OSIRIS-REx descended toward, thumped into, and then quickly moved away from the small near-Earth asteroid 101955 Bennu. The featured video depicts the Touch-And-Go (TAG) sampling event over a three-hour period. As the movie begins, the automated probe approaches the 500-meter, diamond-shaped, space rock as it rotates noticeably below. About 20 seconds into the video, Nightingale comes into view -- a touchdown area chosen to be relatively flat and devoid of large boulders that could damage the spaceship. At 34 seconds, the shadow of OSIRIS-REx's sampling arm suddenly comes into view, while very soon thereafter rocks and gravel fly from the arm's abrupt hard impact. The wily spacecraft was able to capture and successfully stow some of Bennu's ejecta for return to Earth for a detailed analysis. This long return is scheduled to start in 2021 March with arrival back on Earth in 2023 September. If the return sample does successfully reach Earth, it will be scrutinized for organic compounds that might have seeded a young Earth, rare or unusual elements and minerals, and clues about the early history of our Solar System.",2020-11-03,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -M17: Omega Nebula Star Factory,"In the depths of the dark clouds of dust and molecular gas known as M17, stars continue to form. Visible in the above recently released representative-color photograph of M17 by the New Technology Telescope are clouds so dark that they appear almost empty of near infrared light. The darkness of these molecular clouds results from background starlight being absorbed by thick carbon-based smoke-sized dust. As bright massive stars form, they produce intense and energetic light that slowly boils away the dark shroud. M17's unusual appearance has garnered it such nicknames as the Omega Nebula, the Horseshoe Nebula, and the Swan Nebula. M17, visible with binoculars towards the constellation of Sagittarius, lies 5000 light-years away and spans 20 light-years across.",2000-09-19,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Our Solar System from Voyager,"After taking spectacular pictures of our Solar System's outer planets, Voyager 1 looked back at six planets to take our Solar System's first family portrait. Here Venus, Earth, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, were all visible across the sky. Each, however, was now just a small speck of light, dimmer than many of the stars in the sky. Voyager 1 is only one of four human-made objects to leave our Solar System, the other three being Voyager 2, and Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11. ",1996-12-14,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Crew-1 Mission Launch Streak,"Leaving planet Earth for a moment, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket arced into the early evening sky last Sunday at 7:27 pm EST from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39A. This 3 minute 20 second exposure traces the launch streak as seen over watery reflections from Port Canaveral, about 15 miles south of the launch. The rocket carried four astronauts en route to the International Space Station on the first flight of a NASA-certified commercial human spacecraft system. Dubbed Resilience, the astronauts' Crew Dragon spacecraft successfully docked with the orbital outpost one day later, on Monday, November 16. At the conclusion of their six-month stay on the ISS, the Crew-1 astronauts will use their spacecraft to return to Earth. Of course about 9 minutes after launch the Falcon 9 rocket's first stage returned to Earth, landing in the Atlantic Ocean on autonomous spaceport drone ship Just Read The Instructions.",2020-11-19,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -A Dust Devil Crater on Mars,"What caused the streaks in this Martian crater? Since the above image shows streaks occurring both inside and outside the crater, they were surely created after the crater-causing impact. Newly formed trails like these presented researchers with a tantalizing martian mystery but have now been identified as likely the work of miniature wind vortices known to occur on the red planet - martian dust devils. Another example of wind processes on an active Mars, dust devils had been detected passing near the Viking and Mars Pathfinder landers. Such spinning columns of rising air heated by the warm surface are common in dry and desert areas on planet Earth. Typically lasting only a few minutes, they becoming visible as they pick up loose dust. On Mars, dust devils can be up to 8 kilometers high and leave dark trails as they disturb the bright, reflective surface dust.",2003-12-30,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Comet PanSTARRS with Galaxy,"Sweeping slowly through northern skies, the comet PanSTARRS C/2012 K1 posed for this telescopic portrait on June 2nd in the constellation Ursa Major. Now within the inner solar system, the icy body from the Oort cloud sports two tails, a lighter broad dust tail and crooked ion tail extending below and right. The comet's condensed greenish coma makes a nice contrast with the spiky yellowish background star above. NGC 3319 appears at the upper left of the frame that spans almost twice the apparent diameter of the full Moon. The spiral galaxy is about 47 million light-years away, far beyond the stars in our own Milky Way. In comparison, the comet was a mere 14 light-minutes from our fair planet. This comet PanSTARRS will slowly grow brighter in the coming months remaining a good target for telescopic comet watchers and reaching perihelion, its closest approach to the Sun, while just beyond Earth's orbit in late August.",2014-06-06,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Two Black Holes Dancing in 3C 75,"What's happening at the center of active galaxy 3C 75? The two bright sources at the center of this composite x-ray (blue)/ radio (pink) image are co-orbiting supermassive black holes powering the giant radio source 3C 75. Surrounded by multimillion degree x-ray emitting gas, and blasting out jets of relativistic particles the supermassive black holes are separated by 25,000 light-years. At the cores of two merging galaxies in the Abell 400 galaxy cluster they are some 300 million light-years away. Astronomers conclude that these two supermassive black holes are bound together by gravity in a binary system in part because the jets' consistent swept back appearance is most likely due to their common motion as they speed through the hot cluster gas at 1200 kilometers per second. Such spectacular cosmic mergers are thought to be common in crowded galaxy cluster environments in the distant universe. In their final stages the mergers are expected to be intense sources of gravitational waves.",2008-11-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Young Stars in the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud,"Cosmic dust clouds and embedded newborn stars glow at infrared wavelengths in this tantalizing false-color view from the Spitzer Space Telescope. Pictured is of one of the closest star forming regions, part of the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex some 400 light-years distant near the southern edge of the pronounceable constellation Ophiuchus. The view spans about 5 light-years at that estimated distance. After forming along a large cloud of cold molecular hydrogen gas, newborn stars heat the surrounding dust to produce the infrared glow. An exploration of the region in penetrating infrared light has detected some 300 emerging and newly formed stars whose average age is estimated to be a mere 300,000 years -- extremely young compared to the Sun's age of 5 billion years.",2009-11-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Higgs Boson Explained by Cartoon,"What is all this fuss about the Higgs boson? The physics community is abuzz that a fundamental particle expected by the largely successful Standard Model of particle physics may soon be found by the huge Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Europe. The term boson refers to a type of fundamental particle with similarities to the photon, while Higgs refers to Peter Higgs, a physicist who among others published research predicting the mechanism through which such a particle might act. The above animated cartoon explains in humorous but impressive detail why the Higgs boson is expected, and one method that the Large Hadron Collider is using to find it. Although some rumors hint that preliminary traces of the Higgs boson are already being found, even not finding this unusual particle would open the door to a new fundamental understanding of how our universe works.",2012-05-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Jupiter's Two Largest Storms Nearly Collide,"Two storms systems larger than Earth are nearly colliding right now on planet Jupiter. No one was sure what would happen, but so far both storms have survived. In the above false-color infrared image taken last week by the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii, the red spots appear white because their cloud tops tower above other clouds. Blue color represents lower clouds than white, while clouds colored red are the deepest. The smaller red spot, sometimes called Red Spot Jr. or just Oval BA, turned red earlier this year for reasons unknown. If both Jovian hurricanes continue to survive, they will surely pass near each other again in a few years since they revolve around Jupiter at different rates. Astronomers will continue to monitor Red Spot Jr. closely, however, to see if it will remain red when it rotates away from the larger Great Red Spot.",2006-07-25,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Noctilucent Clouds and Aurora Over Scotland,"Why would the sky still glow after sunset? Besides stars and the band of our Milky Way galaxy, the sky might glow because it contains either noctilucent clouds or aurora. Rare individually, both are visible in the above time lapse movie taken over Caithness, Scotland, UK taken during a single night earlier this month. First noted in 1885, many noctilucent clouds are known to correlate with atmospheric meteor trails, although details and the origins of others remain a topic of research. These meandering bright filaments of sunlight-reflecting ice crystals are the highest clouds in the Earth's atmosphere. The above video captures not only a variety of noctilucent clouds, but also how their structure varies over minutes. Lower clouds typically appear dark or fast moving. About halfway through the video the clouds are joined by aurora. At times, low clouds, noctilucent clouds, and aurora are all visible simultaneously, each doing their own separate dance, and once -- see if you can find it -- even with the Big Dipper rotating across the background. Follow APOD on: Facebook (Daily) (Sky) (Spanish) or Google Plus (Daily) (River)",2013-08-19,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -The Unexpected Tails of Asteroid P5,"What is happening to asteroid P/2013 P5? No one is sure. For reasons unknown, the asteroid is now sporting not one but six discernible tails. The above images were taken two months ago by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope and show the rapidly changing dust streams. It is not even known when P5 began displaying such unusual tails. Were the main belt asteroid struck by a large meteor, it would be expected to sport a single dust tail. Possible explanations include that light pressure from the Sun is causing the asteroid to rotate increasingly rapidly, which in turn causes pools of previously gravity-bound dust to spin off. Future observations should better indicate how P5 and its dust plumes are evolving and so provide more clues to its nature -- and to how many similar asteroids might exist.",2013-11-12,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -HH1/HH2: Star Jets,"A cloud of interstellar gas and dust collapses and a star is born. At its core temperatures rise, a nuclear furnace ignites, and a rotating dusty disk forms surrounding the newborn star. According to current understanding, as material continues to fall onto the disk it is heated and blasted back out along the disk's axis of rotation, forming a pair of high speed jets. This Hubble Space Telescope image shows two nebulosities at the ends of opposing jets from a young star. The bright blobs at either end are where the jet material has slammed into interstellar gas. Tip to tip, the distance is about one light-year. Located near the Orion Nebula, these nebulosities have catalog designations HH1 and HH2 for their discoverers astronomers George Herbig and Guillermo Haro. The nascent star which produced the jets is in the middle, hidden by a cloud of obscuring dust. Yet the structures and details visible in the star jets offer clues to events which also occured in our own Solar System - when the Sun was formed from a collapsing interstellar cloud 4.5 billion years ago.",1997-06-19,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Rockets and Robert Goddard,"Robert H. Goddard, one of the founding fathers of modern rocketry, was born in Worcester Massachusetts in 1882. As a 16 year old, Goddard read H.G. Wells' science fiction classic ""War Of The Worlds"" and dreamed of spaceflight. By 1926 he had designed, built, and launched the world's first liquid fuel rocket. During his career he was ridiculed by the press for suggesting that rockets could be flown to the Moon, but he kept up his experiments in rocketry supported in part by the Smithsonian Institution and championed by Charles Lindbergh. Pictured above in 1937 in the desert near Roswell New Mexico, Goddard examines a nose cone and parachute from one of his test rockets. Widely recognized as a gifted experimenter and engineering genius, his rockets were many years ahead of their time. He died in 1945 holding over 200 patents in rocket technology. A liquid fuel rocket constructed on principles developed by Goddard landed humans on the Moon in 1969.",1995-09-16,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -Saharan Starry Night,"This panoramic image of a starry night looks across a dry, desolate landscape. The magnificent view was recorded from Tassili National Park, in the heart of the Sahara desert in southern Algeria. Rising above eroded sandstone cliffs, the celestial menagerie of constellations includes Draco the Dragon, Cygnus the Swan, Aquila the Eagle, and Scorpius the Scorpion. Ruling planet Jupiter shines through clouds very close to the horizon near picture center, while star clouds of the Milky Way arc through Sagittarius above the rocks at the far right. Bright blue stars Deneb, in Cygnus, and Altair, in Aquila, also shine in the starry night along with Scorpius' bright yellowish star Antares, the rival of Mars. Prehistoric skygazers surely witnessed a similar sky. In addition to dramatic sandstone formations, the Tassili region is noted for rock art and archaeological sites dating to Neolithic times when the local climate was wetter.",2009-06-27,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -433 Eros (A898 PA),NEO with diameter between 22.01 and 49.21 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -719 Albert (A911 TB),NEO with diameter between 2.03 and 4.53 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -887 Alinda (A918 AA),NEO with diameter between 4.53 and 10.14 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1036 Ganymed (A924 UB),NEO with diameter between 38.78 and 86.70 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1221 Amor (1932 EA1),NEO with diameter between 0.89 and 1.99 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1566 Icarus (1949 MA),NEO with diameter between 1.30 and 2.91 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1580 Betulia (1950 KA),NEO with diameter between 3.08 and 6.89 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1620 Geographos (1951 RA),NEO with diameter between 2.35 and 5.25 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1627 Ivar (1929 SH),NEO with diameter between 7.22 and 16.15 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1685 Toro (1948 OA),NEO with diameter between 3.70 and 8.28 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1862 Apollo (1932 HA),NEO with diameter between 1.62 and 3.61 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1863 Antinous (1948 EA),NEO with diameter between 2.15 and 4.81 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1864 Daedalus (1971 FA),NEO with diameter between 2.85 and 6.37 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1865 Cerberus (1971 UA),NEO with diameter between 1.17 and 2.61 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1866 Sisyphus (1972 XA),NEO with diameter between 8.41 and 18.79 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1915 Quetzalcoatl (1953 EA),NEO with diameter between 0.56 and 1.25 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1916 Boreas (1953 RA),NEO with diameter between 2.72 and 6.08 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1917 Cuyo (1968 AA),NEO with diameter between 3.50 and 7.84 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1943 Anteros (1973 EC),NEO with diameter between 1.93 and 4.31 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 -1980 Tezcatlipoca (1950 LA),NEO with diameter between 4.56 and 10.19 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:45:05.020346 +IC 405: The Flaming Star Nebula,"Rippling dust and gas lanes give the Flaming Star Nebula its name. The orange and purple colors of the nebula are present in different regions and are created by different processes. The bright star AE Aurigae, visible toward the image left, is so hot it is blue, emitting light so energetic it knocks electrons away from surrounding gas. When a proton recaptures an electron, red light is frequently emitted (depicted here in orange). The purple region's color is a mix of this red light and blue light emitted by AE Aurigae but reflected to us by surrounding dust. The two regions are referred to as emission nebula and reflection nebula, respectively. Pictured here in the Hubble color palette, the Flaming Star Nebula, officially known as IC 405, lies about 1500 light years distant, spans about 5 light years, and is visible with a small telescope toward the constellation of the Charioteer (Auriga).",2020-01-07,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Equinox + 1,"Twice a year, at the Spring and Fall equinox, the Sun rises due east. In an emphatic demonstration of this celestial alignment, photographer Joe Orman recorded this inspiring image of the Sun rising exactly along the east-west oriented Western Canal, in Tempe, Arizona, USA. But he waited until March 21st, one day after the equinox, to photograph the striking view. Why was the rising Sun due east one day after the equinox? At Tempe's latitude the Sun rises at an angle, arcing southward as it climbs above the horizon. Because the distant mountains hide the true horizon, the Sun shifts slightly southward by the time it clears the mountain tops. Waiting 24 hours allowed the Sun to rise just north of east and arc back to an exactly eastern alignment for the photo. Orman also notes that this picture carries a special significance as we experience the maximum of the solar activity cycle. The electricity and telephone transmission lines along the canal symbolize power and communications grids which are most vulnerable to outbursts from the active Sun.",2001-03-30,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Earth at Twilight,"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 reflect gently reddened sunlight filtered through the dusty troposphere, the lowest layer of the planet's nurturing atmosphere. A clear high altitude layer, visible along the dayside's upper edge, scatters blue sunlight and fades into the blackness of space. This picture actually is a single digital photograph taken in June of 2001 from the International Space Station orbiting at an altitude of 211 nautical miles.",2013-04-06,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +A Flow of Time,"This surreal timelapse, landscape, panorama spans predawn, blue hour, and sunrise skies. Close to the start of planet Earth's northern hemisphere spring, the flow of time was captured between 4:30 and 7:00 am from a location overlooking northern New Mexico's Rio Grande Valley. In tracked images of the night sky just before twilight begins, the Milky Way is cast across the southern (right) edge of the panoramic frame. Toward the east, a range of short and long exposures resolves the changing brightness as the Sun rises over the distant peaks of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. In between, exposures made during the spring morning's tantalizing blue hour are used to blend the night sky and sunrise over the high desert landscape.",2020-04-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +The Universe in Hot Gas,"Where is most of the normal matter in the Universe? Recent observations from the Chandra X-ray Observatory confirm that it is in hot gas filaments strewn throughout the universe. ""Normal matter"" refers to known elements and familiar fundamental particles. Previously, the amount of normal matter predicted by the physics of the early universe exceeded the normal matter in galaxies and clusters of galaxies, and so was observationally unaccounted for. The Chandra observations found evidence for the massive and hot intergalactic medium filaments by noting a slight dimming in distant quasar X-rays likely caused by hot gas absorption. The above image derives from a computer simulation showing an expected typical distribution of hot gas in a huge slice of the universe 2.7 billion light-years across and 0.3 billion light years thick. The distribution of much more abundant dark matter likely mimics the normal matter, although the composition of the dark matter remains mysterious. Both the distribution and the nature of the even more abundant dark energy also remain unknown.",2002-08-20,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Salt Water Remnants on Ceres,"Does Ceres have underground pockets of water? Ceres, the largest asteroid in the asteroid belt, was thought to be composed of rock and ice. At the same time, Ceres was known to have unusual bright spots on its surface. These bright spots were clearly imaged during Dawn's exciting approach in 2015. Analyses of Dawn images and spectra indicated that the bright spots arise from the residue of highly-reflective salt water that used to exist on Ceres' surface but evaporated. Recent analysis indicates that some of this water may have originated from deep inside the dwarf planet, indicating Ceres to be a kindred spirit with several Solar System moons, also thought to harbor deep water pockets. The featured video shows in false-color pink the bright evaporated brine named Cerealia Facula in Occator Crater. In 2018, the mission-successful but fuel-depleted Dawn spacecraft was placed in a distant parking orbit, keeping it away from the Ceres' surface for at least 20 years to avoid interfering with any life that might there exist. Experts Debate: How will humanity first discover extraterrestrial life?",2020-09-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Animation: Perseid Meteor Shower,"Where do Perseid meteors come from? Mostly small bits of stony grit, Perseid meteoroids were once expelled from Comet Swift-Tuttle and continue to follow this comet's orbit as they slowly disperse. The featured animation depicts the entire meteoroid stream as it orbits our Sun. When the Earth nears this stream, as it does every year, the Perseid Meteor Shower occurs. Highlighted as bright in the animation, comet debris this size is usually so dim it is practically undetectable. Only a small fraction of this debris will enter the Earth's atmosphere, heat up and disintegrate brightly. This weekend promises some of the better skies to view the Perseid shower as well as other active showers because the new moon will not only be faint, it will be completely absent from the sky for most of the night. Although not outshining faint Perseids, the new moon will partially obstruct the Sun as a partial solar eclipse will be visible from some northern locations.",2018-08-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Saturn at Opposition,"Telescopic observers on Earth have been treated to spectacular views of Saturn lately as the ringed planet reached its 2015 opposition on May 23 at 0200 UT. Of course opposition means opposite the Sun in Earth's sky. So near opposition Saturn is up all night, at its closest and brightest for the year. These sharp images taken within hours of the Sun-Earth-Saturn alignment also show the strong brightening of Saturn's rings known as the opposition surge or the Seeliger Effect. Directly illuminated, the ring's icy particles cast no shadows and strongly backscatter sunlight toward planet Earth, creating the dramatic surge in brightness. Saturn currently stands in the sky not far from bright Antares, alpha star of the constellation Scorpius.",2015-05-29,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Find the New Moon,"Can you find the Moon? This usually simple task can be quite difficult. Even though the Moon is above your horizon half of the time, its phase can be anything from crescent to full. The featured image was taken in late May from Sant Martí d'Empúries, Spain, over the Mediterranean Sea in the early morning. One reason you can't find this moon is because it is very near to its new phase, when very little of the half illuminated by the Sun is visible to the Earth. Another reason is because this moon is near the horizon and so seen through a long path of Earth's atmosphere -- a path which dims the already faint crescent. Any crescent moon is only visible near the direction the Sun, and so only locatable near sunrise or sunset. The Moon runs through all of its phases in a month (moon-th), and this month the thinnest sliver of a crescent -- a new moon -- will occur in three days.",2022-07-25,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Andromeda's Core,"The center of the Andromeda galaxy is beautiful but strange. Andromeda, indexed as M31, is so close to our own Milky Way Galaxy that it gives a unique perspective into galaxy composition by allowing us to see into its core. Billions of stars swarm around a center that has two nuclei and likely houses a supermassive black hole over 5 million times the mass of our Sun. M31 is about two million light years away and visible with the unaided eye towards the constellation of Andromeda, the princess. Pictured above, dark knots of dust are seen superposed on the inner 10,000 light years of M31's core. The brighter stars are foreground stars located in our Milky Way Galaxy.",2004-12-27,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Mars over Duddo Stone Circle,"Why are these large stones here? One the more famous stone circles is the Duddo Five Stones of Northumberland, England. Set in the open near the top of a modest incline, a short hike across empty fields will bring you to unusual human -sized stones that are unlike anything surrounding them. The grooved, pitted, and deeply weathered surfaces of the soft sandstones are consistent with being placed about 4000 years ago -- but placed for reasons now unknown. The featured image -- a composite of two consecutive images taken from the same location -- was captured last October under a starry sky when the Earth was passing near Mars, making the red planet unusually large and bright. Mars remains visible at sunset, although increasingly close to the horizon over the next few months. APOD via Instagram in: English, Indonesian, Persian, and Portuguese",2021-03-23,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Star Cluster Dreams,"Located some 7,000 light-years away toward the constellation Perseus, this pair of open or galactic star clusters really is visible to the unaided eye and was cataloged in 130 BC by Greek astronomer Hipparchus. Now known as h and chi Persei (NGC 869/884), the clusters themselves are separated by a few hundred light-years and contain stars much younger, and hotter than the Sun. But what if this famous double star cluster were closer, say only 700 light-years distant from our fair solar system, crowding our sky with stars? Astrophotographer Jose Suro also imagines a clear, moonless, dark night sky on a warm evening near tranquil waters. The foreground is illuminated by starlight in his composited dreamlike image of the cluster pair. He notes that while the solar system is not in the vicinity of such rich clusters of stars, dark night skies and warm evenings can still be inspiring on planet Earth.",2006-04-13,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Comet Pons-Brooks' Swirling Coma,"A bright comet will be visible during next month's total solar eclipse. This very unusual coincidence occurs because Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks's return to the inner Solar System places it by chance only 25 degrees away from the Sun during Earth's April 8 total solar eclipse. Currently the comet is just on the edge of visibility to the unaided eye, best visible with binoculars in the early evening sky toward the constellation of the Fish (Pisces). Comet Pons-Brooks, though, is putting on quite a show for deep camera images even now. The featured image is a composite of three very specific colors, showing the comet's ever-changing ion tail in light blue, its outer coma in green, and highlights some red-glowing gas around the coma in a spiral. The spiral is thought to be caused by gas being expelled by the slowly rotating nucleus of the giant iceberg comet. Although it is always difficult to predict the future brightness of comets, Comet Pons-Brook has been particularly prone to outbursts, making it even more difficult to predict how bright it will actually be as the Moon moves in front of the Sun on April 8. Total Eclipse Info: 2024 Total Solar Eclipse from NASA",2024-03-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Solstice to Solstice Solargraph Timelapse,"The 2019 December Solstice, on the first day of winter in planet Earth's northern hemisphere and summer in the south, is at 4:19 Universal Time December 22. That's December 21 for North America, though. Celebrate with a timelapse animation of the Sun's seasonal progression through the sky. It was made with solargraph images from an ingenious array of 27 pinhole cameras. The first frame from the Solarcan camera matrix was recorded near December 21, 2018. The last frame in the series finished near June 21, 2019, the northern summer solstice. All 27 camera exposures were started at the same time, with a camera covered and removed from the array once a week. Viewed consecutively the pinhole camera pictures accumulate the traces of the Sun's daily path from winter (bottom) to summer (top) solstice. Traces of the Sun's path are reflected by the foreground Williestruther Loch, in the Scottish Borders. Just select the image or follow this link to play the entire 27 frame (gif) timelapse.",2019-12-21,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Stars and Dust Through Baade's Window,"Billions of stars light up the direction toward the center of our Galaxy. The vast majority of these stars are themselves billions of years old, rivaling their home Milky Way Galaxy in raw age. These stars are much more faint and red than the occasional young blue stars that light up most galaxies. Together with interstellar dust, these old stars make a yellowish starscape, as pictured above. Although the opaque dust obscures the true Galactic center in visible light, a relative hole in the dust occurs on the right of the image. This region, named Baade's Window for an astronomer who studied it, is used to inspect distant stars and to determine the internal geometry of the Milky Way. Baade's Window occurs toward the constellation of Sagittarius.",2002-12-23,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +"Two Worlds, One Sun","How different does sunset appear from Mars than from Earth? For comparison, two images of our common star were taken at sunset, one from Earth and one from Mars. These images were scaled to have same angular width and featured here side-by-side. A quick inspection will reveal that the Sun appears slightly smaller from Mars than from Earth. This makes sense since Mars is 50% further from the Sun than Earth. More striking, perhaps, is that the Martian sunset is noticeably bluer near the Sun than the typically orange colors near the setting Sun from Earth. The reason for the blue hues from Mars is not fully understood, but thought to be related to forward scattering properties of Martian dust. The terrestrial sunset was taken in 2012 March from Marseille, France, while the Martian sunset was captured last month by NASA's robotic Curiosity rover from Gale crater on Mars.",2015-05-12,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Saturn in View,"Very good telescopic views of Saturn can be expected in the coming days as the ringed planet nears opposition on March 8th, its closest approach to Earth in 2009. Of course, opposition means opposite the Sun in planet Earth's sky - an arrangement that occurs almost yearly for Saturn. But while Saturn itself grows larger in telescopic images, Saturn's rings seem to be vanishing as their tilt to our line-of-sight decreases. In fact, the rings will be nearly invisible, edge-on from our perspective, by September 4. Recorded on February 28, this sharp image was made with the 1 meter telescope at Pic Du Midi, a mountain top observatory in the French Pyrenees. The rings are seen to be tilted nearly edge-on, but remarkable details are visible in the gas giant's cloud bands. The icy moon Tethys appears just beyond the rings at the lower left.",2009-03-04,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Galactic Collision in Cluster Abell 1185,"What is a guitar doing in a cluster of galaxies? Colliding. Clusters of galaxies are sometimes packed so tight that the galaxies that compose them collide. A prominent example occurs on the left of the above image of the rich cluster of galaxies Abell 1185. There at least two galaxies, cataloged as Arp 105 and dubbed The Guitar for their familiar appearance, are pulling each other apart gravitationally. Most of Abell 1185's hundreds of galaxies are elliptical galaxies, although spiral, lenticular, and irregular galaxies are all clearly evident. Many of the spots on the above image are fully galaxies themselves containing billions of stars, but some spots are foreground stars in our own Milky Way Galaxy. Recent observations of Abell 1185 have found unusual globular clusters of stars that appear to belong only to the galaxy cluster and not to any individual galaxy. Abell 1185 spans about one million light years and lies 400 million light years distant.",2005-11-22,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +NGC 4676: When Mice Collide,"These two mighty galaxies are pulling each other apart. Known as "" The Mice"" because they have such long tails, each spiral galaxy has likely already passed through the other. They will probably collide again and again until they coalesce. The long tails are created by the relative difference between gravitational pulls on the near and far parts of each galaxy. Because the distances are so large, the cosmic interaction takes place in slow motion -- over hundreds of millions of years. NGC 4676 lies about 300 million light-years away toward the constellation of Bernice's Hair (Coma Berenices) and are likely members of the Coma Cluster of Galaxies. The above picture was taken with the Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys which is more sensitive and images a larger field than previous Hubble cameras. The camera's increased sensitivity has imaged, serendipitously, galaxies far in the distance scattered about the frame.",2008-02-24,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +NGC 1818: A Young Globular Cluster,"Globular clusters once ruled the Milky Way. Back in the old days, back when our Galaxy first formed, perhaps thousands of globular clusters roamed our Galaxy. Today, there are perhaps 200 left. Many globular clusters were destroyed over the eons by repeated fateful encounters with each other or the Galactic center. Surviving relics are older than any Earth fossil, older than any other structures in our Galaxy, and limit the universe itself in raw age. There are few, if any, young globular clusters in our Milky Way Galaxy because conditions are not ripe for more to form. Things are different next door, however, in the neighboring LMC galaxy. Pictured above is a ""young"" globular cluster residing there: NGC 1818. Observations show it formed only about 40 million years ago - just yesterday compared to the 12 billion year ages of globular clusters in our own Milky Way",2002-12-29,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +The Potsdam Gravity Potato,"Why do some places on Earth have higher gravity than others? Sometimes the reason is unknown. To help better understand the Earth's surface, sensitive measurements by the orbiting satellites GRACE and CHAMP were used to create a map of Earth's gravitational field. Since a center for studying these data is in Potsdam, Germany, and since the result makes the Earth look somewhat like a potato, the resulting geoid has been referred to as the Potsdam Gravity Potato. High areas on this map, colored red, indicate areas where gravity is slightly stronger than usual, while in blue areas gravity is slightly weaker. Many bumps and valleys on the Potsdam Gravity Potato can be attributed to surface features, such as the North Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the Himalayan Mountains, but others cannot, and so might relate to unusually high or low sub-surface densities. Maps like this also help calibrate changes in the Earth's surface including variable ocean currents and the melting of glaciers. The above map was made in 2005, but more recent and more sensitive gravity maps of Earth were produced in 2011. Now Available: APOD 2015 Wall Calendars",2014-12-15,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Rosetta's Target Comet,"The Rosetta spacecraft captured this remarkable series of 9 frames between March 27 and May 4, as it closed from 5 million to 2 million kilometers of its target comet. Cruising along a 6.5 year orbit toward closest approach to the Sun next year, periodic comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is seen moving past a distant background of stars in Ophiuchus and globular star cluster M107. The comet's developing coma is actually visible by the end of the sequence, extending for some 1300 km into space. Rosetta is scheduled for an early August rendezvous with the comet's nucleus. Now clearly active, the nucleus is about 4 kilometers in diameter, releasing the dusty coma as its dirty ices begin to sublimate in the sunlight. The Rosetta lander's contact with the surface of the nucleus is anticipated in November. Meteor Shower Hunt Tonight: Looking for the Camelopardalids",2014-05-23,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Atlas 5 Rocket Launches to the Moon,"This rocket is headed for the Moon. Pictured above, a huge Altas V rocket roared off the launch pad last week to start NASA's first missions to Earth's Moon in 10 years. The rocket is carrying two robotic spacecraft. The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) is scheduled to orbit and better map the Moon, search for buried and hidden ice, and return many high resolution images. Some images will be below one-meter in resolution and include images of historic Apollo landing sites. Exploratory data and images should allow a more informed choice of possible future astronaut landing sites. The Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) is scheduled to monitor the controlled impact of the rocket's upper stage into a permanently shadowed crater near the Moon's south pole. This impact, which should occur in about three months, might be visible on Earth through small telescopes.",2009-06-22,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Martian Crater Shows Evidence of Dried Pond,"Did a pond once exist in this Martian crater? Recent photographs by the spacecraft Mars Global Surveyor, currently in orbit around Mars, show features unusual for Mars yet similar to a dried pond on Earth. Previously, much evidence suggested the effects of ancient channels of flowing water on Mars, but less evidence had been found for dried pools of water. Islands and bays on this crater floor indicate an accumulation of some liquid, however, a hypothesis consistent with channels found on the (inset) crater walls. As it is also possible the features were formed by other mechanisms including flowing lava, future observations and analysis will be needed to say for sure.",1998-06-03,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Whirlpool with Comets,"Not a comet, bright spiral galaxy Messier 51 is popularly known as the Whirlpool Galaxy. Just off the handle of the Big Dipper in northern skies, you can spot it at the upper left in this image from December 1st. The pretty 4 by 2.5 degree wide field of view does contain two comets though. Different in appearance, both comets are new visitors to the inner Solar System and are currently faint telescopic objects, highest above northern horizons in morning twilight. At lower left newly discovered comet NEOWISE (C/2016 U1) shows off a round fuzzy coma in the greenish light of diatomic carbon gas fluorescing in sunlight. Sunlight reflects from dust in the coma and stubby tail of comet Johnson (C/2015 V2) at upper right.",2016-12-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Stellar Spectral Types: OBAFGKM,"Astronomers divide stars into different spectral types. First started in the 1800s, the spectral type was originally meant to classify the strength of hydrogen absorption lines. A few types that best describe the temperature of the star remain in use today. The seven main spectral types OBAFGKM are shown above with the spectrum of a single ""O"" star at the top followed by two spectra each from the progressively cooler designations, respectively. Historically, these letters have been remembered with the mnemonic ""Oh Be A Fine Girl/Guy Kiss Me."" Frequent classroom contests, however, have come up with other more/less politically correct mnemonics such as ""Oven Baked Apples From Grandpa's/Grandma's Kitchen. Mmmm."" Our Sun has spectral type ""G"".",2001-05-30,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +A Rare Hybrid Solar Eclipse,"A spectacular geocentric celestial event of 2005 was a rare hybrid eclipse of the Sun - a total or an annular eclipse could be seen depending on the observer's location. For Fred Espenak, aboard a gently swaying ship within the middle of the Moon's shadow track about 2,200 kilometers west of the Galapagos, the eclipse was total, the lunar silhouette exactly covering the bright solar disk for a few brief moments. His camera captured a picture of totality revealing the extensive solar corona and prominences rising above the Sun's edge. But for Stephan Heinsius, near the end of the shadow track at Penonome Airfield, Panama, the Moon's apparent size had shrunk enough to create an annular eclipse, showing a complete annulus of the Sun's bright disk as a dramatic ring of fire. Pictures from the two locations are compared above. How rare is such a hybrid eclipse? Calculations show that during the 21st century just 3.1% (7 out of 224) of solar eclipses are hybrid while hybrids comprise about 5% of all solar eclipses over the period 2000 BC to AD 3000. Today's hybrid solar eclipse is most widely visible beyond the central shadow track as a brief partial eclipse from northeastern Americas through Africa, and along the track in an annular phase for only the first 15 seconds. Tomorrow's APOD?: Share your best eclipse pictures.",2013-11-03,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Comet Siding Spring Passes Mars,"Yesterday, a comet passed very close to Mars. In fact, Comet C/2013 A1 (Siding Spring) passed closer to the red planet than any comet has ever passed to Earth in recorded history. To take advantage of this unique opportunity to study the close interaction of a comet and a planet, humanity currently has five active spacecraft orbiting Mars: NASA's MAVEN, MRO, Mars Odyssey, as well as ESA's Mars Express, and India's Mars Orbiter. Most of these spacecraft have now sent back information that they have not been damaged by small pieces of the passing comet. These spacecraft, as well as the two active rovers on the Martian surface -- NASA's Opportunity and Curiosity -- have taken data and images that will be downloaded to Earth for weeks to come and likely studied for years to come. The featured image taken yesterday, however, was not taken from Mars but from Earth and shows Comet Siding Spring on the lower left as it passed Mars, on the upper right. NASA Updates : Comet Siding Spring from Mars",2014-10-20,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Lunar Halo over Snowy Trees,"Have you ever seen a halo around the Moon? This fairly common sight occurs when high thin clouds containing millions of tiny ice crystals cover much of the sky. Each ice crystal acts like a miniature lens. Because most of the crystals have a similar elongated hexagonal shape, light entering one crystal face and exiting through the opposing face refracts 22 degrees, which corresponds to the radius of the Moon Halo. A similar Sun Halo may be visible during the day. Exactly how ice-crystals form in clouds remains a topic of research. In the featured image taken last week from Östersund, Sweden, a complete lunar halo was captured over snowy trees and rabbit tracks. APOD is available via Instagram: in English, Indonesian, Persian, and Portuguese",2021-02-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Mapping Mars,"This month, the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) spacecraft began its primary mission to the red planet. Orbiting about once every two hours at an altitude of over 200 miles, instruments onboard MGS now regularly explore the Martian surface and atmosphere. This MGS polar mapping orbit was set up to achieve a favorable ""afternoon"" sun-angle for imaging as the spacecraft crosses over the day side of the planet. Mars' rotation will allow complete coverage of the surface roughly once every week with mapping operations planned for one Martian year (687 Earth days). These two opposite hemisphere views of Mars were pieced together from MGS wide-angle camera scans made in early March (blue and red lines mark the scan edges). Water-ice clouds can be seen hovering over the surface while the north polar cap is visible at the top of each image.",1999-03-19,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +ESO202-G23: Merging Galaxies,SO202-G23 is a colorful mess. It is a collision between two galaxies taking place over hundreds of millions of years. The representative colors give astronomers some idea of what is going on. Visible in this jumble is an active nucleus spewing ultraviolet radiation which lights up surrounding gas (blue); galactic arms contorted by the gravity of the collision (green); a star forming complex left of center (blue); and dust (red). In billions of years this mess might settle into a relatively normal looking galaxy.,1999-01-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Earthset from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter,"On the Moon, the Earth never rises -- or sets. If you were to sit on the surface of the Moon, you would see the Earth just hang in the sky. This is because the Moon always keeps the same side toward the Earth. Curiously, the featured image does picture the Earth setting over a lunar edge. This was possible because the image was taken from a spacecraft orbiting the Moon - specifically the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO). In fact, LRO orbits the Moon so fast that, from the spacecraft, the Earth appears to set anew about every two hours. The featured image captured one such Earthset about three months ago. By contrast, from the surface of the Earth, the Moon sets about once a day -- with the primary cause being the rotation of the Earth. LRO was launched in 2009 and, while creating a detailed three dimensional map of the Moon's surface, is also surveying the Moon for water and possible good landing spots for future astronauts. Free APOD Lectures: Editor to speak this coming weekend in Philadelphia and New York City",2016-01-04,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Wanderers,"How far out will humanity explore? If this video's fusion of real space imagery and fictional space visualizations is on the right track, then at least the Solar System. Some of the video's wondrous sequences depict future humans drifting through the rings of Saturn, exploring Jupiter from a nearby spacecraft, and jumping off a high cliff in the low gravity of a moon of Uranus. Although no one can know the future, wandering and exploring beyond boundaries -- both physical and intellectual -- is part of the human spirit and has frequently served humanity well in the past.",2014-12-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +M104: The Sombrero Galaxy,"The famous Sombrero galaxy (M104) is a bright nearby spiral galaxy. The prominent dust lane and halo of stars and globular clusters give this galaxy its name. Something very energetic is going on in the Sombrero's center, as much X-ray light has been detected from it. This X-ray emission coupled with unusually high central stellar velocities cause many astronomers to speculate that a black hole lies at the Sombrero's center - a black hole a billion times the mass of our Sun. This image was taken in blue light by the 0.9 meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory.",1995-11-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +M57: The Ring Nebula,"cept for the rings of Saturn, the Ring Nebula (M57) is probably the most famous celestial band. This planetary nebula's simple, graceful appearance is thought to be due to perspective -- our view from planet Earth looking straight into what is actually a barrel-shaped cloud of gas shrugged off by a dying central star. Astronomers of the Hubble Heritage Project produced this strikingly sharp image from Hubble Space Telescope observations using natural appearing colors to indicate the temperature of the stellar gas shroud. Hot blue gas near the energizing central star gives way to progressively cooler green and yellow gas at greater distances with the coolest red gas along the outer boundary. Dark, elongated structures can also be seen near the nebula's edge. The Ring Nebula is about one light-year across and 2,000 light-years away in the northern constellation Lyra.",2001-07-29,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Complex Jupiter,"How complex is Jupiter? NASA's Juno mission to Jupiter is finding the Jovian giant to be more complicated than expected. Jupiter's magnetic field has been discovered to be much different from our Earth's simple dipole field, showing several poles embedded in a complicated network more convoluted in the north than the south. Further, Juno's radio measurements show that Jupiter's atmosphere shows structure well below the upper cloud deck -- even hundreds of kilometers deep. Jupiter's newfound complexity is evident also in southern clouds, as shown in the featured image. There, planet-circling zones and belts that dominate near the equator decay into a complex miasma of continent-sized storm swirls. Juno continues in its looping elliptical orbit, swooping near the huge planet every 53 days and exploring a slightly different sector each time around.",2018-06-05,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Phobos over Mars,"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 of Mars was captured in late 2021 by ESA's robot spacecraft Mars Express, currently orbiting Mars. Phobos is a heavily cratered and barren moon, with its largest crater located on the far side. From images like this, Phobos has been determined to be covered by perhaps a meter of loose dust. Phobos orbits so close to Mars that from some places it would appear to rise and set twice a day, while from other places it would not be visible at all. Phobos' orbit around Mars is continually decaying -- it will likely break up with pieces crashing to the Martian surface in about 50 million years. Your Sky Surprise: What picture did APOD feature on your birthday? (post 1995)",2023-07-31,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +The Veins of Heaven,"Transfusing sunlight through a still dark sky, this exceptional display of noctilucent clouds was captured earlier this month, reflected in the calm waters of Vallentuna Lake near Stockholm, Sweden. From the edge of space, about 80 kilometers above Earth's surface, the icy clouds themselves still reflect sunlight even though the Sun is below the horizon as seen from the ground. Usually spotted at high latitudes in summer months the night shining clouds have made a strong showing so far during the short northern summer nights. Also known as polar mesopheric clouds they are understood to form as water vapor driven into the cold upper atmosphere condenses on the fine dust particles supplied by disintegrating meteors or volcanic ash. NASA's AIM mission provides daily projections of noctilucent clouds as seen from space.",2019-07-26,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Eta Car: 3D Model of the Most Dangerous Star Known,"What's the most dangerous star near earth? Many believe it's Eta Carinae, a binary star system about 100 times the mass of the Sun, just 10,000 light years from earth. Eta Carinae is a ticking time bomb, set to explode as a supernova in only a few million years, when it may bathe the earth in dangerous gamma rays. The star suffered a notorious outburst in the 1840s when it became the brightest star in the southern sky, only to fade to obscurity within decades. The star was not destroyed, but lies hidden behind a thick, expanding, double-lobed structure called the Homunculus which now surrounds the binary. Studies of this ejecta provide forensic clues about the explosion. Using observations from NASA satellites we can now visualize the 3D distribution of the shrapnel, all the way from the infrared, through optical and UV, to the outermost shell of million-degree material, visible only in X-rays.",2022-02-09,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +A Sagittarius Starscape,"Many vast star fields in the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy are rich in clouds of stars, dust, and gas. First and foremost, visible in the above picture are millions of stars, many of which are similar to our Sun. Next huge filaments of dark interstellar dust run across the image and block the light from millions of more stars yet further across our Galaxy. The bright red region on the left is the Omega Nebula, an emission nebula of mostly hot hydrogen gas also known as M17. A small bright grouping of stars near the image center is the open cluster M18, while the long bright streak of stars just right of center is M24. On the far right of the image is the picturesque red emission nebula IC 1283 flanked by two blue reflection nebulas NGC 6589 and NGC 6590. These objects are visible with a small telescope toward the constellation of Sagittarius.",2002-09-18,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Eclipsed Moon in Infrared,"The total lunar eclipse of September 1996 disappointed many observers in North America who were cursed with cloudy skies. However, the Midcourse Space Experiment (MSX) satellite had a spectacular view from Earth orbit and SPIRIT III, an on board infrared telescope, was used to repeatedly image the moon during the eclipse. Above is one of the images taken during the 70 minute totality, the Moon completely immersed in the Earth's shadow. Infrared light has wavelengths longer than visible light - humans can not see it but feel it as heat. The bright spots correspond to the warm areas on the lunar surface, dark areas are cooler. The brightest spot below and left of center is the crater Tycho, the dark region at the upper right is the Mare Crisium. The series of SPIRIT III images allow the determination of cooling rates for geologically different areas, exploring the physical properties of the Moon's surface.",2003-11-08,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Massive Nearby Spiral Galaxy NGC 2841,"It is one of the more massive galaxies known. A mere 46 million light-years distant, spiral galaxy NGC 2841 can be found in the northern constellation of Ursa Major. This sharp view of the gorgeous island universe shows off a striking yellow nucleus and galactic disk. Dust lanes, small, pink star-forming regions, and young blue star clusters are embedded in the patchy, tightly wound spiral arms. In contrast, many other spirals exhibit grand, sweeping arms with large star-forming regions. NGC 2841 has a diameter of over 150,000 light-years, even larger than our own Milky Way and captured by this composite image merging exposures from the orbiting 2.4-meter Hubble Space Telescope and the ground-based 8.2-meter Subaru Telescope. X-ray images suggest that resulting winds and stellar explosions create plumes of hot gas extending into a halo around NGC 2841.",2015-04-28,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Apollo 14 Heads for Home,"When leaving lunar orbit in February 1971, the crew of Apollo 14 watched this Earthrise from their command module Kitty Hawk. With Earth's sunlit crescent just peeking over the lunar horizon, the cratered terrain in the foreground is along the lunar farside. Of course, while orbiting the Moon, the crew could watch Earth rise and set, but the Earth hung stationary in the sky over Fra Mauro Base, their landing site on the lunar surface. Rock samples brought back by the Apollo 14 mission included a 20 pound rock nicknamed Big Bertha, later determined to contain a likely fragment of a meteorite from planet Earth.",2020-02-01,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Bright Comet SOHO,"Discovered this month with an orbiting solar observatory, bright Comet SOHO has now emerged from the Sun's glare. This telephoto picture of the new naked-eye comet was taken by astrophotographer Michael Horn after sunset in the western twilight above Lake Samsonvale, Brisbane, Australia on May 18. The comet is seen in the constellation Orion. Its long lovely tail stretches nearly 5 degrees to the bright star Bellatrix, near the top of the image. For Southern Hemisphere comet watchers, views of Comet SOHO (1998J1) will improve as this month draws to a close and the comet climbs to the south and east on its journey outward bound. In February 1999, NASA plans to launch the Stardust mission to fly close to a comet and return samples of dust from a comet's tail.",1998-05-21,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Reflections on the Inner Solar System,"Only Mars is missing from this reflective view of the major rocky bodies of the inner solar system. Captured on July 8th, the serene, twilight picture looks out over the Flat Tops Wilderness area from near Toponas, Colorado, USA and includes planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Earth's large natural satellite, the Moon. The Moon is in a young crescent phase about three degrees above bright planet Venus. Forest fires contribute to a layer of smoke in Earth's sky that almost hides planet Mercury, still visible very near the horizon. Just a week earlier Venus and Mercury were joined by Saturn, forming a notable grouping in the west also enjoyed by skygazers across planet Earth.",2005-07-15,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Green Flash at Moonrise,"Follow a sunset on a clear day against a distant horizon and you might glimpse a green flash just as the Sun disappears, the sunlight briefly refracted over a long sight-line through atmospheric layers. You can spot a green flash at sunrise too. Pinpointing the exact place and time to see the rising Sun peeking above the horizon is a little more difficult though, and it can be harder still to catch a green flash from the fainter rising Moon. But well-planned snapshots did record a green flash at the Full Moon's upper edge on June 2nd, from the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on the Canary Island of La Palma. Looking a little south of due east, this long telephoto view finds the rising Moon above mountains and a sea of clouds. In sunlit profile are the mountaintop Teide Observatory telescope domes on the island of Tenerife some 143 kilometers away.",2015-06-05,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +A View Toward M106,"Big, bright, beautiful spiral, Messier 106 dominates this cosmic vista. The nearly two degree wide telescopic field of view looks toward the well-trained constellation Canes Venatici, near the handle of the Big Dipper. Also known as NGC 4258, M106 is about 80,000 light-years across and 23.5 million light-years away, the largest member of the Canes II galaxy group. For a far far away galaxy, the distance to M106 is well-known in part because it can be directly measured by tracking this galaxy's remarkable maser, or microwave laser emission. Very rare but naturally occurring, the maser emission is produced by water molecules in molecular clouds orbiting its active galactic nucleus. Another prominent spiral galaxy on the scene, viewed nearly edge-on, is NGC 4217 below and right of M106. The distance to NGC 4217 is much less well-known, estimated to be about 60 million light-years, but the bright spiky stars are in the foreground, well inside our own Milky Way galaxy.",2024-02-22,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Galaxy Cluster Gas Creates Hole in Microwave Background,"Why would this cluster of galaxy punch a hole in the cosmic microwave background (CMB)? First, the famous CMB was created by cooling gas in the early universe and flies right through most gas and dust in the universe. It is all around us. Large clusters of galaxies have enough gravity to contain very hot gas -- gas hot enough to up-scatter microwave photons into light of significantly higher energy, thereby creating a hole in CMB maps. This Sunyaev�Zel'dovich (SZ) effect has been used for decades to reveal new information about hot gas in clusters and even to help discover galaxy clusters in a simple yet uniform way. Pictured is the most detailed image yet obtained of the SZ effect, now using both ALMA to measure the CMB and the Hubble Space Telescope to measure the galaxies in the massive galaxy cluster RX J1347.5-1145. False-color blue depicts light from the CMB, while almost every yellow object is a galaxy. The shape of the SZ hole indicates not only that hot gas is present in this galaxy cluster, but also that it is distributed in a surprisingly uneven manner.",2017-04-10,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +NGC 6960: The Witch's Broom Nebula,"Ten thousand years ago, before the dawn of recorded human history, a new light must suddenly have appeared in the night sky and faded after a few weeks. Today we know this light was an exploding star and record the colorful expanding cloud as the Veil Nebula. Pictured above is the west end of the Veil Nebula known technically as NGC 6960 but less formally as the Witch's Broom Nebula. The rampaging gas gains its colors by impacting and exciting existing nearby gas. The supernova remnant lies about 1400 light-years away towards the constellation of Cygnus. This Witch's Broom actually spans over three times the angular size of the full Moon. The bright star 52 Cygnus is visible with the unaided eye from a dark location but unrelated to the ancient supernova.",2004-03-02,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +Conjunction by the Sea,"rly morning risers were treated to a beautiful conjunction of Venus and waning Crescent Moon on June 24, captured in this seaside photo near Belmar, New Jersey, USA, planet Earth. The serene celestial pairing is seen above the Atlantic Ocean horizon as the eastern sky grows brighter with dawn's early light. Wispy, scattered clouds appear in silhouette. But the exposure also reveals the night side of the lunar orb in the arms of the sunlit crescent. That shadowed part of the Moon, with hints of the smooth, dark lunar seas or maria, is illuminated by Earthshine, sunlight reflected from planet Earth itself.",2014-06-26,astronomy,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +433 Eros (A898 PA),NEO with diameter between 22.01 and 49.21 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +719 Albert (A911 TB),NEO with diameter between 2.03 and 4.53 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +887 Alinda (A918 AA),NEO with diameter between 4.53 and 10.14 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1036 Ganymed (A924 UB),NEO with diameter between 38.78 and 86.70 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1221 Amor (1932 EA1),NEO with diameter between 0.89 and 1.99 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1566 Icarus (1949 MA),NEO with diameter between 1.30 and 2.91 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1580 Betulia (1950 KA),NEO with diameter between 3.08 and 6.89 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1620 Geographos (1951 RA),NEO with diameter between 2.35 and 5.25 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1627 Ivar (1929 SH),NEO with diameter between 7.22 and 16.15 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1685 Toro (1948 OA),NEO with diameter between 3.70 and 8.28 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1862 Apollo (1932 HA),NEO with diameter between 1.62 and 3.61 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1863 Antinous (1948 EA),NEO with diameter between 2.15 and 4.81 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1864 Daedalus (1971 FA),NEO with diameter between 2.85 and 6.37 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1865 Cerberus (1971 UA),NEO with diameter between 1.17 and 2.61 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1866 Sisyphus (1972 XA),NEO with diameter between 8.41 and 18.79 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1915 Quetzalcoatl (1953 EA),NEO with diameter between 0.56 and 1.25 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1916 Boreas (1953 RA),NEO with diameter between 2.72 and 6.08 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1917 Cuyo (1968 AA),NEO with diameter between 3.50 and 7.84 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1943 Anteros (1973 EC),NEO with diameter between 1.93 and 4.31 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721 +1980 Tezcatlipoca (1950 LA),NEO with diameter between 4.56 and 10.19 km,,neo,NASA,2024-12-20 19:47:01.374721