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Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD)
NGC 4650A: Strange Galaxy and Dark Matter
25.06.1998
This strangely distorted galaxy of stars is cataloged as NGC 4650A. It lies about 165 million light-years away in the southern constellation Centaurus. The complex system seems to have at least two parts, a flattened disk of stars with a dense, bright, central core and a sparse, sharply tilted ring of gas, dust and stars.
Sparkling Star May Indicate Galactic Composition
24.06.1998
If a star in this photograph twinkled slightly, would anyone notice? Would anyone care? Astronomers with the MACHO Collaboration noticed one such twinkle just last week, and many members of the astronomical community now care.
A Slice Through an Artificial Universe
23.06.1998
We live in the era of humanity when most of our Universe is being mapped. To help understand these maps, astronomers computationally estimate the appearance of several possible candidate universes, to which maps of the real Universe can be compared.
The Doomed Dust Disk of NGC 7052
22.06.1998
What created the dust disk in the center of NGC 7052, and what keeps it spinning? Although the disk might appear as a relatively tame "hubcap in space", the unusual center of elliptical galaxy NGC 7052 is probably the remnant of a titanic collision between galaxies.
Edwin Hubble Discovers the Universe
21.06.1998
No person in history has had greater impact in determining the extent of our universe than Edwin Hubble. From proving that other galaxies existed to proving that galaxies move apart from one another, Hubble's work defined our place in the cosmos.
Pioneer 10: The First 6 Billion Miles
20.06.1998
Q: What was made by humans and is 6.5 billion miles away? A: Pioneer 10 - and last year was the 25th anniversary of its launch. More than 9.5 light-hours distant, Pioneer 10 is presently about twice as far from the Sun as Pluto, bound for interstellar space at 28,000 miles per hour.
Good Morning Mars
19.06.1998
Looking down on the Northern Hemisphere of Mars on June 1, the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft's wide angle camera recorded this morning image of the red planet. Mars Global Surveyor's orbit...
Cosmic Rays and Supernova Dust
18.06.1998
Cosmic Rays are celestial high energy particles traveling at nearly the speed of light, which constantly bombard the Earth. Discovered during high altitude balloon flights in 1912 their source has been a long standing mystery.
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey Telescope
17.06.1998
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) will soon begin. Pictured above is the 2.5-meter telescope poised to create the most ambitious sky map in the history of astronomy. SDSS will catalog one quarter of the sky down past 23rd magnitude ( R), obtaining redshifts for galaxies and quasars brighter than magnitude 19.
An Active Region of the Sun
16.06.1998
The Sun is a busy place. This false-color image depicts an active region near an edge of the Sun. Hot plasma is seen exploding off the Sun's photosphere and traveling along loops defined by the Sun's magnetic field.
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