Astronomy Picture of the Day

2006-03-22

Some images of Saturn appear surreal. Earlier this year, the robot spacecraft Cassini now orbiting Saturn took this surreal image of the gas giant Saturn, its majestic rings, and its enigmatic world Enceladus all in one frame. Enceladus, ...

2006-03-21 Misti Mountain Observatory

Almost every object in the above photograph is a galaxy. The Coma Cluster of Galaxies pictured above is one of the densest clusters known - it contains thousands of galaxies. Each of these galaxies houses billions of stars - just as our own ...

2006-03-20 MicroFUN Collaboration

Are "super-Earths" common around other star systems? Quite possibly. Unexpected evidence for this came to light recently when a planet orbiting a distant star gravitationally magnified the light of an even more distant star. Assuming the ...

2006-03-19 MPC

Our Solar System is a busy place. Although the major planets get the most press, a swarm of rocks, comets, and asteroids also exist. The above plot shows the placement of known inner Solar System objects on 2002 July 20. The light blue lines ...

2006-03-18 Mike Salway

Jupiter's Great Red Spot is a swirling storm seen for over 300 years, since the beginning of telescopic observations of the Solar System's ruling gas giant. But over the last month it has been joined by Red Spot Jr. Thought to be similar to the ...

2006-03-17 Noel Carboni

A well-known asterism in northern skies, The Big Dipper is easy to recognize even when viewed upside down. Part of the larger constellation of Ursa Major, the bright dipper stars above are named (left to right along the dipper) Dubhe, Merak, ...

2006-03-15

You can make it. Winter is rapidly advancing on the southern hemisphere on Mars, and the lack of sunlight could be dangerous unless you find a good place to hibernate. There it is ahead: McCool Hill. As the robotic Spirit rover rolling across ...

2006-03-14 T. A. Rector

Can a gas cloud eat a galaxy? It's not even close. The odd looking "creature" in the center of the above photo is a gas cloud known as a cometary globule. This globule, however, has ruptured. Cometary globules are typically characterized by ...

2006-03-13

Why is this plasma so hot? Physicists aren't sure. What is known for sure is that the Z Machine running at Sandia National Laboratories created a plasma that was unexpectedly hot. The plasma reached a temperature in excess of two billion ...

2006-03-12 S. Kafka

This huge ball of stars predates our Sun. Long before humankind evolved, before dinosaurs roamed, and even before our Earth existed, ancient globs of stars condensed and orbited a young Milky Way Galaxy. Of the 200 or so globular clusters that ...