APOD: 2023 May 19 - Curly Spiral Galaxy M63 Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 19 Curly Spiral Galaxy M63 Image Credit &Copyright: Sophie Paulin,Jens Unger,Jakob Sahner Explanation: A bright spiral galaxy of the northern sky,Messier 63is nearby,about 30 million light-years distant toward the loyal constellationCanes Venatici.Also cataloged as NGC 5055, the majesticisland universeis nearly 100,000 light-years across, about the sizeof our own Milky Way.Its bright coreand majesticspiral arms lend the galaxyits popular name, The Sunflower Galaxy.This exceptionally deep exposure also followsfaint, arcing star streams far into the galaxy'shalo.Extending nearly 180,000 light-years from the galactic center, the star streams are likely remnants oftidally disruptedsatellites of M63.Other satellite galaxies of M63 can be spotted inthe remarkable wide-field image,including faintdwarf galaxies,which could contribute to M63's star streams in the next few billionyears. Tomorrow's picture: Galileo's Europa<| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Phillip NewmanSpecific rights apply.NASA WebPrivacy Policy and Important NoticesA service of:ASD atNASA /GSFC& Michigan Tech. U.
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 20 Galileo's Europa Image Credit: NASA,JPL-Caltech,SETI Institute,Cynthia Phillips,Marty Valenti Explanation: Looping through the Jovian system in the late 1990s, theGalileo spacecraftrecorded stunning views of Europa and uncoveredevidence that the moon's icy surface likely hidesa deep, global ocean.Galileo's Europa image data has beenremastered here, with improved calibrations to produce acolor image approximating what the human eye might see.Europa's long curving fractureshintat the subsurface liquid water. The tidal flexingthe large moon experiences in its elliptical orbitaround Jupiter supplies the energy to keep the ocean liquid.But moretantalizing is the possibilitythat even in theabsence of sunlight that process could also supply the energy tosupport life,making Europaone of the best places to look for lifebeyond Earth.What kind of life could thrive in a deep, dark, subsurface ocean?Consider planet Earth's ownextreme shrimp. Tomorrow's picture: almost alien<| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Phillip NewmanSpecific rights apply.NASA WebPrivacy Policy and Important NoticesA service of:ASD atNASA /GSFC& Michigan Tech. U.
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 19 Curly Spiral Galaxy M63 Image Credit &Copyright: Sophie Paulin,Jens Unger,Jakob Sahner Explanation: A bright spiral galaxy of the northern sky,Messier 63is nearby,about 30 million light-years distant toward the loyal constellationCanes Venatici.Also cataloged as NGC 5055, the majesticisland universeis nearly 100,000 light-years across, about the sizeof our own Milky Way.Its bright coreand majesticspiral arms lend the galaxyits popular name, The Sunflower Galaxy.This exceptionally deep exposure also followsfaint, arcing star streams far into the galaxy'shalo.Extending nearly 180,000 light-years from the galactic center, the star streams are likely remnants oftidally disruptedsatellites of M63.Other satellite galaxies of M63 can be spotted inthe remarkable wide-field image,including faintdwarf galaxies,which could contribute to M63's star streams in the next few billionyears. Tomorrow's picture: Galileo's Europa<| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Phillip NewmanSpecific rights apply.NASA WebPrivacy Policy and Important NoticesA service of:ASD atNASA /GSFC& Michigan Tech. U.
APOD: 2023 May 18 - WR 134 Ring Nebula Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 18 WR 134 Ring Nebula Image Credit &Copyright:Craig Stocks Explanation: Made with narrowband filters, thiscosmic snapshotcovers a field of view aboutthe size of the full Moon within theboundaries of the constellation Cygnus.It highlights the bright edge of a ring-like nebula traced by theglow of ionizedsulfur, hydrogen, and oxygen gas.Embedded in the region's interstellarclouds of gas and dust,the complex, glowing arcs are sections of bubbles or shells ofmaterial swept up by the wind fromWolf-Rayet star WR 134,brightest star near the center of the frame.Distance estimates put WR 134 about 6,000 light-years away, makingthe frame over 50 light-years across.Sheddingtheir outer envelopes in powerful stellar winds,massive Wolf-Rayet stars have burned through their nuclear fuel at aprodigiousrateand end this final phase of massive star evolution ina spectacular supernova explosion.The stellar winds and final supernovae enrich the interstellarmaterial with heavy elementsto be incorporated infuture generations of stars. Tomorrow's picture: curly spiral galaxy <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 18 WR 134 Ring Nebula Image Credit &Copyright:Craig Stocks Explanation: Made with narrowband filters, thiscosmic snapshotcovers a field of view aboutthe size of the full Moon within theboundaries of the constellation Cygnus.It highlights the bright edge of a ring-like nebula traced by theglow of ionizedsulfur, hydrogen, and oxygen gas.Embedded in the region's interstellarclouds of gas and dust,the complex, glowing arcs are sections of bubbles or shells ofmaterial swept up by the wind fromWolf-Rayet star WR 134,brightest star near the center of the frame.Distance estimates put WR 134 about 6,000 light-years away, makingthe frame over 50 light-years across.Sheddingtheir outer envelopes in powerful stellar winds,massive Wolf-Rayet stars have burned through their nuclear fuel at aprodigiousrateand end this final phase of massive star evolution ina spectacular supernova explosion.The stellar winds and final supernovae enrich the interstellarmaterial with heavy elementsto be incorporated infuture generations of stars. Tomorrow's picture: curly spiral galaxy <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA Official: Phillip...
APOD: 2023 May 12 - Halley Dust, Mars Dust, and Milky Way Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 12 Halley Dust, Mars Dust, and Milky Way Image Credit &Copyright:Petr Horalek /Institute of Physics in Opava Explanation: Grains of cosmic duststreaked through night skies in early May.Swept up as planet Earth plowed through thedebris streams left behind byperiodic Comet Halley,the annual meteor shower is known as the Eta Aquarids.This year, the Eta Aquarids peak was visually hampered byMay's bright Full Moon, though.But early morning hours surrounding last May's shower of Halley dust werefree of moonlight interference.In exposures recorded betweenApril 28 and May 8 in 2022,this composited imageshows nearly 90 Eta Aquarid meteors streaking from the shower'sradiant in Aquarius over San Pedro de Atacama, Chile.The central Milky Way arcs above inthe southern hemisphere's predawn skies.The faint band of light rising from the horizon is Zodiacal light,caused by dust scattering sunlight near our Solar System's ecliptic plane.Along the ecliptic and entrained in the Zodiacal gloware the bright planetsVenus, Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn. Of course Mars itselfhas recently been found to be a likely sourceof...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 13 Apollo 17: The Crescent Earth Image Credit: Apollo 17,NASA;Restoration -Toby Ord Explanation: Our fair planetsports a curved, sunlit crescentagainst the black backdrop of space in this stunning photograph.From the unfamiliar perspective,the Earth is smalland, like atelescopic image of a distant planet,the entire horizon is completely within the field of view.Enjoyed bycrews on boardthe International Space Station,only much closer views of the planet are possible from low Earth orbit.Orbiting the planet once every 90 minutes, a spectacle of clouds, oceans,and continentsscrolls beneath themwith the partial arc of the planet's edge in the distance.But this digitally restored imagepresents a view so faronly achieved by 24 humans,Apollo astronautswho traveled to the Moon and back again between 1968 and 1972.The original photograph,AS17-152-23420,was taken by the homeward bound crew ofApollo 17, on December 17, 1972.For now it is the last picture of Earth from thisplanetary perspective taken by human hands. Tomorrow's picture: free space<| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA...
APOD: 2023 May 11 - Fomalhaut's Dusty Debris Disk Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 11 Fomalhaut's Dusty Debris Disk Image Credit: NASA,ESA,CSA,Processing: András Gáspár (Univ. of Arizona),Alyssa Pagan (STScI),Science: A. Gáspár (Univ. of Arizona) et al. Explanation: Fomalhautis a bright star, a 25 light-yearvoyagefrom planet Earth in the directionof the constellationPiscisAustrinus.Astronomers firstnoticedFomalhaut's excess infrared emission in the 1980s.Space and ground-based telescopeshave sinceidentified the infrared emission's source as a disk of dusty debris,evidence fora planetary system surrounding the hot, young star. But this sharp infrared imagefrom the James Webb Space Telescope's MIRI camerareveals details of Fomalhaut's debris disk never before seen,including a large dust cloud in the outer ring that is possibleevidence for colliding bodies,andan inner dust disk and gap likely shaped andmaintained by embedded but unseen planets.An image scale bar in auor astronomical units, the average Earth-Sun distance,appears at the lower left.Fomalhaut's outer circumstellar dust ring liesat about twice the distance of our own Solar System'sKuiper Belt ofsmall icy bodies and debris beyond the orbit of Neptune. Tomorrow's picture: Halley dust <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education|...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 12 Halley Dust, Mars Dust, and Milky Way Image Credit &Copyright:Petr Horalek /Institute of Physics in Opava Explanation: Grains of cosmic duststreaked through night skies in early May.Swept up as planet Earth plowed through thedebris streams left behind byperiodic Comet Halley,the annual meteor shower is known as the Eta Aquarids.This year, the Eta Aquarids peak was visually hampered byMay's bright Full Moon, though.But early morning hours surrounding last May's shower of Halley dust werefree of moonlight interference.In exposures recorded betweenApril 28 and May 8 in 2022,this composited imageshows nearly 90 Eta Aquarid meteors streaking from the shower'sradiant in Aquarius over San Pedro de Atacama, Chile.The central Milky Way arcs above inthe southern hemisphere's predawn skies.The faint band of light rising from the horizon is Zodiacal light,caused by dust scattering sunlight near our Solar System's ecliptic plane.Along the ecliptic and entrained in the Zodiacal gloware the bright planetsVenus, Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn. Of course Mars itselfhas recently been found to be a likely sourceof the dust along the ecliptic responsible for...
APOD: 2023 May 5 - Shackleton from ShadowCam Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 5 Shackleton from ShadowCam Image Credit:NASA,ShadowCam,Korea Aerospace Research Institute,Arizona State University Explanation: Shackleton crater lies atthe lunar south pole.Peaks along its 21 kilometer diameterare in sunlight, but Shackleton's floor is indark permanent shadow.Still, this image of the shadowed rim wall and floorof Shackleton crater wascaptured from NASA's ShadowCam,an instrument on board the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter(KPLO) launched in August 2022.About 200 times more sensitive than, for example, the LunarReconnaissance Orbiter's Narrow Angle Camera,ShadowCam was designed toimage the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar surface.Avoiding direct sunlight, those regions are expected to bereservoirs of water-iceand other volatiles deposited by ancient cometary impacts anduseful to future Moon missions.Of course, the permanently shadowed regions arestill illuminated by reflections of sunlight fromnearby lunar terrain.In this stunninglydetailed ShadowCam image,an arrow marks the track made by a single boulder rolling downShackleton crater's wall.The image scale is indicated at the bottom of the frame. Tomorrow's picture: twilight in a flower <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 5 Shackleton from ShadowCam Image Credit:NASA,ShadowCam,Korea Aerospace Research Institute,Arizona State University Explanation: Shackleton crater lies atthe lunar south pole.Peaks along the 21 kilometer diameterare in sunlight, but Shackleton's floor is indark permanent shadow.Still, this image of the shadowed rim wall and floorof Shackleton crater wascaptured from NASA's ShadowCam,an instrument on board the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter(KPLO) launched in August 2022.About 200 times more sensitive than, for example, the LunarReconnaissance Orbiter's Narrow Angle Camera,ShadowCam was designedimage the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar surface.Avoiding direct sunlight, those regions are expected to bereservoirs of water-iceand other volatiles deposited by ancient cometary impacts anduseful to future Moon missions.Of course, the permanently shadowed regions arestill illuminated by reflections of sunlight fromnearby lunar terrain.In this stunninglydetailed ShadowCam image,an arrow marks the track made by a single boulder rolling downShackleton crater's wall.The image scale is indicated at the bottom of the frame. Tomorrow's picture: twilight in a flower <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU)...
APOD: 2023 May 4 - The Galaxy, the Jet, and a Famous Black Hole Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 4 The Galaxy, the Jet, and a Famous Black Hole Image Credit:NASA,JPL-Caltech,Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration Explanation: Bright elliptical galaxy Messier 87 (M87)is home to thesupermassive black hole captured in 2017 by planet Earth'sEvent Horizon Telescopein the first ever image of a black hole.Giant of the Virgo galaxy cluster about 55 million light-years away,M87 is the large galaxy rendered in blue hues in this infraredimagefrom the Spitzer Space telescope. Though M87 appears mostly featureless and cloud-like,the Spitzer image does record details of relativisticjets blasting from the galaxy's central region.Shown in the inset at top right, the jets themselvesspan thousands of light-years.The brighter jet seen on theright is approaching and close to our line of sight.Opposite, the shock created by the otherwise unseen receding jetlights up a fainter arc of material.Inset at bottom right, thehistoric black hole image is shownin context, at the center of giant galaxy and relativistic jets.Completely unresolved in the Spitzer image, thesupermassiveblack hole surrounded by infalling material is the...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 May 4 The Galaxy, the Jet, and a Famous Black Hole Image Credit:NASA,JPL-Caltech,Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration Explanation: Bright elliptical galaxy Messier 87 (M87)is home to thesupermassive black hole captured in 2017 by planet Earth'sEvent Horizon Telescopein the first ever image of a black hole.Giant of the Virgo galaxy cluster about 55 million light-years away,M87 is the large galaxy rendered in blue hues in this infraredimagefrom the Spitzer Space telescope. Though M87 appears mostly featureless and cloud-like,the Spitzer image does record details of relativisticjets blasting from the galaxy's central region.Shown in the inset at top right, the jets themselvesspan thousands of light-years.The brighter jet seen on theright is approaching and close to our line of sight.Opposite, the shock created by the otherwise unseen receding jetlights up a fainter arc of material.Inset at bottom right, thehistoric black hole image is shownin context, at the center of giant galaxy and relativistic jets.Completely unresolved in the Spitzer image, thesupermassiveblack hole surrounded by infalling material is the source of enormous energy drivingtherelativistic jets from the center...
Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos!Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe isfeatured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2023 April 29 Solar Eclipse from a Ship Image Credit:Fred Espenak Explanation: Along a narrow paththat mostly avoided landfall,the shadow of theNew Moon racedacross planet Earth's southern hemisphereon April 20 to create a rareannular-total orhybrid solar eclipse.From the Indian Ocean off the coast of western Australia,ship-borne eclipse chasers were able to witness 62 secondsof totality thoughwhile anchored near the centerline of the total eclipse track.This ship-borne image of the eclipse capturesthe active Sun's magnificent outer atmosphere orsolar corona streaming into space.A composite of 11 exposures ranging from 1/2000 to 1/2 second,it records an extended range of brightnessto follow details of the corona not quite visible to the eye duringthe total eclipse phase.Of courseeclipsestend to come in pairs.On May 5, thenext Full Moonwill just miss the dark inner part of Earth's shadowin a penumbral lunar eclipse. Total Solar Eclipse of 2023 April Gallery: Notable Submissions to APOD Tomorrow's picture: subtle Saturnian moon <| Archive| Submissions | Index| Search| Calendar| RSS| Education| About APOD| Discuss| > Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff(MTU) &Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)NASA...