The Long Jet of the Lighthouse Nebula
21.02.2014

The Lighthouse nebula was formed by the wind of a pulsar, a rapidly rotating, magnetized neutron star, as it speeds through the interstellar medium at over 1,000 kilometers per second. Some...

The Center of Globular Cluster Omega Centauri
14.09.2009

What is left over after stars collide? To help answer this question, astronomers have been studying the center of the most massive ball of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy. In the center of globular cluster Omega Centauri, stars are packed in 10,000 times more densely than near our Sun.

Fermi Epicyles: The Vela Pulsar s Path
4.05.2012

Exploring the cosmos at extreme energies, the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope orbits planet Earth every 95 minutes. By design, it rocks to the north and then to the south on alternate orbits in order to survey the sky with its Large Area Telescope (LAT).

M51: X Rays from the Whirlpool
10.06.2014

What if we X-rayed an entire spiral galaxy? This was done (again) recently by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory for the nearby interacting galaxies known as the Whirlpool (M51). Hundreds of glittering x-ray stars are present in the above Chandra image of the spiral and its neighbor.

ULXs in M74
30.03.2005

In visual appearance, M74 is a nearly perfect face-on spiral galaxy, about 30 million light-years away toward the constellation Pisces. The red blotches seen in this composite view are ultraluminous x-ray sources (ULXs) mapped by the Chandra X-ray Observatory.

The Elusive Jellyfish Nebula
15.05.2010

Normally faint and elusive, the Jellyfish Nebula is caught in this alluring, false-color, telescopic view. Flanked by two bright stars, Mu and Eta Geminorum, at the foot of a celestial twin, the Jellyfish Nebula is the brighter arcing ridge of emission with dangling tentacles below and right of center.

Elements in the Aftermath
26.10.2001

Massive stars spend their brief lives furiously burning nuclear fuel. Through fusion at extreme temperatures and densities surrounding the stellar core, nuclei of light elements like Hydrogen and Helium are combined to heavier elements like Carbon, Oxygen, etc. in a progression which ends with Iron.

Northern Mercury
1.12.2012

Innermost planet Mercury would probably not be a good location for an interplanetary winter olympics. But new results based on data from the Mercury orbiting MESSENGER spacecraft indicate that it does have substantial water ice in permanently shadowed regions within craters near its north pole.

X Rays From Antennae Galaxies
3.02.2004

A bevy of black holes and neutron stars shine as bright, point-like sources against bubbles of million degree gas in this false-color x-ray image from the orbiting Chandra Observatory. The striking picture spans about...

SGR 1900+14 : Magnetar
3.09.1998

On August 27th an intense flash of X-rays and gamma-rays swept through our Solar System. Five spacecraft of the Third InterPlanetary gamma-ray burst Network, Ulysses, WIND, RXTE, NEAR, and BeppoSAX, recorded the high energy...