Friday, July 24, 2015: Astrophotographer Panos Evripiotis sent in a photo of stars appearing to trail over the Temple of Demeter on the island of Naxos,…Read More »
Greece. He writes in an email message to Space.com: "[T]he temple is located south of the village Sagkri on Naxos Island. [In] the foreground you can see the Temple of Demeter which was [built] out of marble [in] the late 6th century BC. The location was a place of worship from the 8th century BC, and was dedicated to earth deities. [In] the background of the image, even though it's a star trail image, you can easily spot the Pleiades trail on the far right of the photo. I was at the location of the temple for about 3 hours, shooting continuously with my camera and my laptop until I was happy with the results." Photo undated.
Thursday, July 23, 2015: The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) has spent almost 20 years viewing the sun. This composition shows the waxing and…Read More »
waning of the sun’s corona as it follows an 11-year cycle of activity. SOHO’s extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope captures images of the of the sun’s atmosphere, the corona, impossible to record from the ground. In this composite image, brighter images show times when the sun displayed more activity. Each of the images shown here was taken in the springtime. Image released July 13, 2015.
Wednesday, July 22, 2015: The dwarf galaxy known as NGC 1140 lies 60 million light-years away in the constellation of Eridanus. NGC 1140, with an irregular…Read More »
form, currently exhibits a starburst, creating a star the size of our sun each year. Bright, blue-white, young stars illuminate the galaxy. Later in its life, the larger stars in the galaxy will die and explode as supernovas, blowing gas into space. The loss of gas, needed to create more stars, will eventually end the starburst. Image released July 20, 2015.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015: Astrophotographer James L. Brown, Jr. sent in a photo of the crescent moon and Venus taken in Calhoun, Georgia, on July 18, 2015.
Monday, July 20, 2015: Astrophotographer Jeff Dai sent in a photo of Venus and Jupiter over Lake Namtso, Tibet, caught on July 15, 2015. Namtso means "Heavenly…Read More »
Lake" in Tibetan, and has earned a reputation for its beauty and high altitude (15,500 feet or 4720 meters). Dai writes in an email message to Space.com: "The water here is a storybook crystal-clear blue. Clear skies join its surface in the distance, creating an integrated, scenic vista. Soul of every visitor who has ever been here seems to be cleansed by the pure water."
Friday, July 17, 2015: NASA's Dawn spacecraft caught a portion of the northern hemisphere of dwarf planet Ceres from an altitude of 2,700 miles (4,400…Read More »
kilometers) on June 21, 2015. Dawn spacecraft explored the giant protoplanet Vesta during 2011-2012 before heading to dwarf planet Ceres. Image released July 10, 2015.
Thursday, July 16, 2015: New Horizons space probe sent to Earth the highest resolution photo of Pluto ever seen, as presented in a NASA press conference…Read More »
on July 15, 2015, at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Maryland. This still frame from an animation shows the close-up frame as an inset on a larger image of Pluto obtained July 13, 2015, for reference. The new image, focused on the base of the heart-shaped feature, shows a mountain range with peaks standing as high as 11,000 feet (3,500 meters). [See the new photo in our full story.]
Wednesday, July 15, 2015: Flight controllers of New Horizons space probe react with jubilation after receiving confirmation that it had completed the historic…Read More »
flyby of Pluto successfully on July 14, 2015, in the Mission Operations Center of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland. New Horizons had been collecting data during the flyby, and was instructed to remain silent until it passed beyond the Pluto system. "We have a healthy spacecraft," announced mission operations manager Alice Bowman of APL to the assembled crowd, which erupted in cheers. [See our complete coverage of the New Horizons mission.]
Tuesday, July 14, 2015: At the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern (left) and…Read More »
other researchers unveil a poster-size reproduction of a US Postal Service $0.29 stamp issued in 1991 showing Pluto with the words: PLUTO NOT YET EXPLORED. Here, the words "NOT YET" have been crossed out, to commemmorate the Pluto probe making its historic flyby moments before on 7:49 am (EDT), July 14, 2015. [Read our full story of the history of the no-longer accurate stamp.]
Monday, July 13, 2015: Tomorrow, July 14, 2015, New Horizons space probe will make its closest approach to dwarf planet Pluto at 7:49 AM EDT. This photo…Read More »
Friday, July 10, 2015: Observations from several telescopes combine to reveal flaring, active regions of the sun in this image. High-energy X-rays from…Read More »
NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) appear in blue; low-energy X-rays from Japan's Hinode spacecraft shine in green; and extreme ultraviolet light from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) glows yellow and red. The three spacecraft took these images at about the same time on April 29, 2015. The active regions on the sun’s surface contain material at a temperature of several millions of degrees. The blue-white areas showing the NuSTAR data identify the most energetic spots. NuSTAR usually looks deeper into the cosmos to observe X-rays from supernovas, black holes and other extreme objects. It can also look at the sun safely and capture images of high-energy X-rays with increased sensitivity over previous levels. Image released July 8, 2015.
Credit: Scott Kelly (via Twitter as @StationCDRKelly)
Thursday, July 9, 2015: NASA astronaut Scott Kelly tweeted this photo of Robonaut 2, taken on the International Space Station, July 7, 2015. He wrote:…Read More »
“#Robonaut and I are happy to hear you are discussing important @ISS_Research at #ISSRDC to improve life on Earth.” The ISSRDC hashtag refers to the ISS R&D Conference taking place in Boston, Massachusetts, July 7-9, 2015. Robonaut 2, NASA’s first humanoid robot in space, was recently named NASA Government Invention of the Year for 2014.
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA; Acknowledgement: Flickr user c.claude
Wednesday, July 8, 2015: Galaxy J04542829-6625280 (LEDA 89996) represents a classic example of a spiral galaxy, similar to our own galaxy, the Milky Way.…Read More »
Seen face on, this image reveals the winding structure of the spiral arms of the disc-shaped galaxy, spotted with dark patches of dust and gas. These materials may eventually coalesce into new stars. Young stars in these regions glow bright and bluish. The galaxy lies within the constellation of Dorado (The Swordfish), very close to the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. Image released July 6, 2015.
Tuesday, July 7, 2015: The Swedish–ESO Submillimeter Telescope stands at the left of this image, alongside the ESO 3.6-meter telescope on the right. Overhead,…Read More »
bright star trails appear to trail above the La Silla Observatory, in the outskirts of the Atacama Desert in Chile. This image combines 250 one-minute exposures, taken during a period of four hours. Reflections in the dish of the telescope include stars and also a car's red lights. Image released July 6, 2015.
Monday, July 6, 2015: The thin, innermost D ring of Saturn shows spiral structures in this image obtained by Cassini spaecraft on on July 6, 2013. The…Read More »
wavy, or "vertically corrugated," spiral may have developed from a warp in the ring created in the early 1980s. (Bright specks and faint vertical streaks seen here are image artifacts.) Image released June 29, 2015.
Friday, July 3, 2015: Happy Fourth of July from Space.com! The American flag flew in space in the cupola of the International Space Station to commemorate…Read More »
Flag Day, June 14, 2015. Photo taken by NASA astronaut Scott Kelly. He tweeted: "Stars and stripes from @Space_Station. Happy #NationalFlagDay! #YearInSpace"
Thursday, July 2, 2015: Astrophotographer Giuseppe Petricca caught the conjunction of two planets in Italy on June 30, 2015. He writes in an email mesage…Read More »
to Space.com: “The sky was clear with only some haze that beautified the sunset colors, and the planets Venus and Jupiter in close conjunction were clearly visible, together over the Leaning Tower of Pisa! Simply an awesome sight!”
Wednesday, July 1, 2015: Galaxies bound to each other by gravity form galaxy clusters, the largest compact structures in the universe. The Virgo cluster…Read More »
of galaxies lies closest to us, some 50 million light-years away, and contains sub-structures such as this grouping of galaxies gravitating about a massive elliptical galaxy, NGC 4365. Image released June 2015.
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