NGC 281: Starless with Stars
19.11.2021

In visible light the stars have been removed from this narrow-band image of NGC 281, a star forming region some 10,000 light-years away toward the constellation Cassiopeia. Stars were digitally added back to the resulting starless image though.

In Motion: Uranus and Moons
30.11.2021

What's that moving across the sky? A planet just a bit too faint to see with the unaided eye: Uranus. The gas giant out past Saturn was tracked earlier this month near opposition -- when it was closest to Earth and at its brightest.

Titan: Moon over Saturn
27.05.2022

Like Earth's moon, Saturn's largest moon Titan is locked in synchronous rotation. This mosaic of images recorded by the Cassini spacecraft in May of 2012 shows its anti-Saturn side, the side always facing away from the ringed gas giant.

APOD: 2024 September 17 Б Melotte 15 in the Heart Nebula
17.09.2024

Cosmic clouds form fantastic shapes in the central regions of emission nebula IC 1805. The clouds are sculpted by stellar winds and radiation from massive hot stars in the nebula's newborn star cluster, Melotte 15.

NGC 1275 in the Perseus Cluster
5.02.2026

Active galaxy NGC 1275 is the central, dominant member of the large and relatively nearby Perseus Cluster of Galaxies. Wild-looking at visible wavelengths, the active galaxy is also a prodigious source of x-rays and radio emission.

APOD: 2026 April 10 Б Exploring the Antennae
10.04.2026

Some 60 million light-years away in the southerly constellation Corvus, two large galaxies are colliding. Stars in the two galaxies, cataloged as NGC 4038 and NGC 4039, very rarely collide in the course of the ponderous cataclysm that lasts for hundreds of millions of years.

Machholz Meets the Pleiades
11.01.2005

Sweeping northward in planet Earth's sky, comet Machholz extended its long ion tail with the Pleiades star cluster in the background on January 7th. This stunning view, recorded with a telephoto lens in skies over Oberjoch, Bavaria, Germany, emphasizes faint, complex tail structures and the scene's lovely blue and green colors.

5 Million Miles From Io
11.03.1999

Twenty years ago this month, NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft flew past Jupiter and its moons. This sharp picture of moon Io against a background of gas giant Jupiter's diffuse swirling cloud bands was recorded by Voyager's camera from a distance of about 5 million miles.

The 220 Mirrors of CRTF
4.10.1999

Even the largest of modern optical telescopes are small when compared with the light gathering power of the Central Receiver Test Facility (CRTF) located in New Mexico, USA. CRTF has 220 mirrors each over 7-meters in diameter all focused on a single tower.

A Total Solar Eclipse Over China
5.08.2008

What's that black dot over the Sun? The Moon. This past weekend, the Sun went dark during the day as the Moon completely covered it. The total solar eclipse was visible over a thin swath of Earth extending from northern Canada to China.