Dark Dust and Colorful Clouds near Antares
26.08.2019

Why is the sky near Antares and Rho Ophiuchi so dusty yet colorful? The colors result from a mixture of objects and processes. Fine dust illuminated from the front by starlight produces blue reflection nebulae. Gaseous clouds whose atoms are excited by ultraviolet starlight produce reddish emission nebulae.

Carina Nebula Dust Pillar
7.02.2015

This cosmic pillar of gas and dust is nearly two light-years wide. The structure lies within one of our galaxy's largest star forming regions, the Carina Nebula, shining in southern skies at a distance of about 7,500 light-years.

APOD: 2024 October 9 Б M106: A Spiral Galaxy with a Strange Center
8.10.2024

What's happening at the center of spiral galaxy M106? A swirling disk of stars and gas, M106's appearance is dominated by blue spiral arms and red dust lanes near the nucleus, as shown in the featured image taken from the Kuwaiti desert.

Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse
15.02.1997

Betelgeuse (sounds a lot like "beetle juice"), a red supergiant star about 600 light years distant, is seen in this Hubble Space Telescope image -- the first direct picture of the surface of a star other than the Sun. A bright, as yet unexplained hotspot is revealed on its surface!

The Cone Nebula Neighborhood
12.04.2007

Cosmic clouds of hydrogen gas and dust abound in this gorgeous skyscape, stretching through Monocerous in the neighborhood of The Cone Nebula. A dark, obscuring dust cloud, the simple, sculpted shape of the Cone Nebula is near the lower left edge.

Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse
21.01.1996

Betelgeuse (sounds a lot like "beetle juice"), a red supergiant star about 600 lightyears distant, is shown here in this Hubble Space Telescope image which represents the first direct picture of the surface of a star other than the Sun.

South Celestial Rocket Launch
27.02.2020

At sunset on December 6 a Rocket Lab Electron rocket was launched from a rotating planet. With multiple small satellites on board it departed on a mission to low Earth orbit dubbed Running Out of Fingers from Mahia Peninsula on New Zealand's north island.

Around The Arches Cluster
14.06.2001

The most compact cluster of stars known in our galaxy, the Arches cluster, boasts 100 or so massive, young stars contained within a diameter of one light-year. Seen toward the constellation Sagittarius, the Arches...

Galactic Supernova Remnant IC 443
21.07.1999

About 8000 years ago, a star in our Galaxy exploded. Ancient humans might have noticed the supernova as a temporary star, but modern humans can see the expanding shell of gas even today.

Star Cluster Dreams
13.04.2006

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.