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Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD)
Messier 2
19.12.2024
After the Crab Nebula, this giant star cluster is the second entry in 18th century astronomer Charles Messier's famous list of things that are not comets. M2 is one of the largest globular star clusters now known to roam the halo of our Milky Way galaxy.
APOD: 2024 December 18 Б NGC 660: Polar Ring Galaxy
18.12.2024
What kind of strange galaxy is this? This rare structure is known as a polar ring galaxy, and it seems to have two different rings of stars. In this galaxy, NGC 660, one ring...
APOD: 2024 December 17 Б Near to the Heart Nebula
17.12.2024
What excites the Heart Nebula? First, the large emission nebula on the upper left, catalogued as IC 1805, looks somewhat like a human heart. The nebula glows brightly in red light emitted by its most prominent element, hydrogen, but this long-exposure image was also blended with light emitted by sulfur (yellow) and oxygen (blue).
APOD: 2024 December 16 Б A Kilometer High Cliff on Comet Churyumov Gerasimenko
16.12.2024
This kilometer high cliff occurs on the surface of a comet. It was discovered on the dark nucleus of Comet Churyumov - Gerasimenko (CG) by Rosetta, a robotic spacecraft launched by ESA, which orbited the comet from 2014 to 2016. The ragged cliff, as featured here, was imaged by Rosetta early in its mission.
APOD: 2024 December 15 Б Geminid Meteors over a Snowy Forest
15.12.2024
Meteors have been flowing out from the constellation Gemini. This was expected, as mid-December is the time of the Geminid Meteor Shower. Pictured here, over two dozen meteors were caught in successively added exposures taken over several hours early Saturday morning from a snowy forest in Poland.
Apollo 17 s Moonship
14.12.2024
Awkward and angular looking, Apollo 17's lunar module Challenger was designed for flight in the near vacuum of space. Digitally enhanced and reprocessed, this picture taken from Apollo 17's command module America shows Challenger's ascent stage in lunar orbit.
M51: Tidal Streams and H-alpha Ciffs
13.12.2024
An intriguing pair of interacting galaxies, M51 is the 51st entry in Charles Messier's famous catalog. Perhaps the original spiral nebula, the large galaxy with whirlpool-like spiral structure seen nearly face-on is also cataloged as NGC 5194. Its spiral arms and dust lanes sweep in front of its smaller companion galaxy, NGC 5195.
Phaethon s Brood
12.12.2024
Based on its well-measured orbit, 3200 Phaethon (sounds like FAY-eh-thon) is recognized as the source of the meteoroid stream responsible for the annual Geminid meteor shower. Even though most meteor shower parents are comets, 3200 Phaethon is a known and closely tracked near-Earth asteroid with a 1.4 year orbital period.
APOD: 2024 December 11 Б The Shells and Jets of Galaxy Centaurus A
11.12.2024
What's the closest active galaxy to planet Earth? That would be Centaurus A, cataloged as NGC 5128, which is only 12 million light-years distant. Forged in a collision of two otherwise normal galaxies...
APOD: 2024 December 10 Б The Great Meteor Storm of 1833
10.12.2024
It was a night of 100,000 meteors. The Great Meteor Storm of 1833 was perhaps the most impressive meteor event in recent history. Best visible over eastern North America during the pre-dawn hours...
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