M104: The Sombrero Galaxy
Image Data:
NASA,
ESO ,
NAOJ,
Giovanni Paglioli -
Processing:
R. Colombari
Explanation:
The striking spiral galaxy
M104 is famous
for its nearly
edge-on
profile featuring a broad ring of obscuring dust lanes.
Seen in silhouette against an extensive bulge of stars, the swath of
cosmic dust lends a
broad brimmed hat-like
appearance to the galaxy suggesting
the more popular moniker, The Sombrero Galaxy.
Hubble Space Telescope
and ground-based Subaru data have been
reprocessed with amateur color image data to
create this sharp view of
the well-known galaxy.
The processing results in a natural color appearance
and preserves details often lost in overwhelming glare of M104's
bright central bulge when viewed with smaller ground-based
instruments.
Also known as NGC 4594, the Sombrero galaxy can be seen
across the spectrum
and is thought to host a central
supermassive
black hole.
About 50,000 light-years across and 28 million light-years away,
M104 is one of the largest galaxies at the southern edge of the
Virgo
Galaxy Cluster.
NGC 4676: When Mice Collide
Image Credit:
ACS Science & Engineering Team,
Hubble Space Telescope,
NASA
Explanation:
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.
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 in 2002.
These galactic mice will probably
collide again and again
over the next billion years until they coalesce to
form a single galaxy.
Jupiter Triple-Moon Conjunction
Image Credit:
NASA,
ESA, and the
Hubble Heritage Team
(STScI/AURA)
Explanation:
Our solar system's
ruling giant planet
Jupiter and 3 of its 4 large Galilean moons are captured in this single
Hubble snapshot
from January 24.
Crossing in front of Jupiter's banded cloud tops
Europa, Callisto, and Io
are framed from lower left to
upper right in a rare triple-moon conjunction.
Distinguishable by colors alone
icy Europa is almost white,
Callisto's ancient cratered surface looks dark brown,
and volcanic Io appears yellowish.
The transiting moons and
moon shadows can be identified by
sliding your cursor over the image, or following
this link.
Remarkably, two small, inner Jovian moons,
Amalthea and Thebe, along with
their shadows,
can
also be found in the
sharp Hubble view.
The Galilean moons have diameters of 3,000 to 5,000 kilometers or so,
comparable in size to Earth's moon.
But odd-shaped Amalthea and Thebe are only about 260 and 100
kilometers across
respectively.
Titan Seas Reflect Sunlight
Image Credit:
NASA,
JPL-Caltech,
U. Arizona,
U. Idaho
Explanation:
Why would the surface of Titan light up with a blinding flash?
The reason: a
sunglint from liquid seas.
Saturn's moon
Titan has numerous smooth
lakes of methane that, when the angle is right,
reflect sunlight as if they were mirrors.
Pictured here in false-color, the
robotic Cassini spacecraft
orbiting Saturn imaged the
cloud-covered Titan last summer in different bands of cloud-piercing
infrared light.
This
specular reflection was so bright it saturated one of Cassini's infrared cameras.
Although the
sunglint was annoying -- it was also useful.
The
reflecting regions confirm that
northern Titan houses a wide and complex array of seas with a geometry that
indicates periods of significant evaporation.
During its numerous passes of our Solar System's most mysterious moon,
Cassini has revealed Titan to be a world with
active weather -- including times when it rains a liquefied version of
natural gas.
Yellow Balls in W33
Image Credit:
NASA/JPL-Caltech
Explanation:
Infrared
wavelengths of 3.6, 8.0, and 24.0 microns
observed by the Spitzer Space Telescope are mapped
into visible colors red, green, and blue in this striking image.
The cosmic cloud of gas and dust is W33, a massive starforming
complex some 13,000 light-years
distant, near the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy.
So what are all those yellow balls?
Citizen scientists of the web-based
Milky Way Project
found the features they called yellow balls as
they scanned many Spitzer images and persistently asked that question
of researchers.
Now there is an answer.
The yellow balls in Spitzer images
are identified as an early stage of massive star formation.
They appear yellow because they are overlapping regions of
red and green, the assigned colors that correspond to
dust and organic molecules known as PAHs at Spitzer wavelengths.
Yellow balls represent the stage before
newborn massive stars
clear out cavities in their surrounding gas and dust
and appear as green-rimmed bubbles with red centers in the Spitzer
image.
Of course, the astronomical crowdsourcing success story is only part of
the Zooniverse.
The Spitzer image spans 0.5 degrees
or about 100 light-years at the estimated distance
of W33.
Comet Lovejoy in a Winter Sky
Image Credit & BY-NC-2 License:
Juan Carlos Casado
(TWAN,
Earth and Stars)
Explanation:
Which of these night sky icons can you find in this beautiful and deep exposure of the northern winter sky?
Skylights include the stars in
Orion's
belt, the
Orion Nebula, the
Pleiades star cluster, the bright stars
Betelgeuse and
Rigel, the
California Nebula,
Barnard's Loop, and
Comet Lovejoy.
The belt stars of Orion are nearly vertical in the central line between
the horizon and the image center, with the lowest belt star obscured by
the red glowing
Flame Nebula.
To the belt's left is the red arc of Barnard's Loop followed by the
bright orange star Betelgeuse, while to the belt's right is the colorful
Orion Nebula followed by the bright blue star Rigel.
The blue cluster of bright stars near the top center is the Pleiades,
and the red nebula to its left is the California nebula.
The bright orange dot above the image center is the star Aldebaran,
while the green object with the long tail to its right is
Comet C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy).
The
featured image was taken about two weeks ago near Palau village in
Spain.
The Milky Way over the Seven Strong Men Rock Formations
Image Credit & Copyright:
Sergei Makurin
Explanation:
You may have heard of the
Seven Sisters in the sky,
but have you heard about the Seven Strong Men on the ground?
Located just west of the
Ural Mountains, the unusual
Manpupuner rock formations are one of the
Seven Wonders of Russia.
How these ancient 40-meter high
pillars formed is yet unknown.
The persistent photographer of
this featured image battled
rough terrain and uncooperative weather to capture these
rugged stone towers in winter at night, being finally successful in February of last year.
Utilizing the camera's time delay feature,
the photographer holds a flashlight in the foreground near one of the snow-covered
pillars.
High above, millions of stars shine down, while the band of our
Milky Way Galaxy crosses diagonally down from the upper left.
A Twisted Solar Eruptive Prominence
Video Credit:
SOHO Consortium,
EIT,
ESA,
NASA
Explanation:
Ten
Earths
could easily fit in the "claw" of this seemingly solar monster.
The monster, actually a huge eruptive prominence, is seen moving out from our
Sun in this condensed half-hour time-lapse sequence.
This
large prominence, though, is significant
not only for its size, but its shape.
The twisted figure eight shape
indicates that a complex
magnetic field threads
through the emerging
solar particles.
Differential rotation of gas just inside the surface of the
Sun might help account for the surface explosion.
The five frame sequence was taken in early 2000 by the
Sun-orbiting
SOHO satellite.
Although
large prominences
and energetic
Coronal Mass Ejections
(CMEs) are relatively rare,
they are again occurring more frequently now that we are near the
Solar Maximum, a time of
peak sunspot and
solar activity in the eleven-year
solar cycle.
Light from Cygnus A
Image Credit:
X-ray:
NASA/CXC/SAO;
Optical:
NASA/STScI;
Radio:
NSF/NRAO/AUI/VLA
Explanation:
Celebrating astronomy in this
International
Year of Light,
the detailed image reveals spectacular active galaxy
Cygnus A
in light across the electromagnetic spectrum.
Incorporating X-ray data
(
blue) from the orbiting Chandra Observatory,
Cygnus A is
seen to be a prodigious source of
high energy x-rays.
But it is actually more
famous
at the low energy end of
the electromagnetic
spectrum.
One of the brightest celestial sources visible to radio telescopes,
at 600 million light-years distant
Cygnus A is the closest powerful radio galaxy.
Radio emission
(
red) extends to either side along the same axis for
nearly 300,000 light-years powered by jets of relativistic particles
emanating from the galaxy's central supermassive black hole.
Hot spots likely mark the ends of the jets impacting surrounding cool,
dense material.
Confined to
yellow hues, optical wavelength data
of the galaxy from Hubble and the surrounding field
in the Digital Sky Survey complete a
remarkable multiwavelength view.
Jets from Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko
Image Credit:
ESA /
Rosetta / MPS for
OSIRIS Team;
MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA
Explanation:
Where do comet tails come from?
Although it is common knowledge that
comet tails and comas originate from comet nuclei,
exactly how that happens is an
active topic of research.
One of the best images yet of
emerging jets is shown in the
featured image, taken last November by the
robotic Rosetta spacecraft in orbit around the
Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (Comet CG), and released last month.
The
overexposed picture shows plumes of gas and dust escaping numerous places from the
Comet CG's nucleus as it nears the Sun and heats up.
Although
Comet CG is currently further out from the
Sun than
Mars, its orbit will take it almost as close as the Earth this coming August, at which time its
jet activity is expected to increase by a factor of about 100.
You've likely seen some debris from
comet nuclei
before but in another form -- when sand-sized bits end their journey
through the Solar System by impacting the atmosphere of Earth as
meteors.
Source of all -
NASA