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Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD)
Approaching Asteroid Itokawa
19.09.2005
What are asteroids made of? To help find out, Japan's JAXA space agency launched the Hayabusa mission to rendezvous with asteroid Itokawa. Last week, the small robotic Hayabusa spacecraft arrived at asteroid Itokawa and stationed itself only 20 kilometers away.
M42: Wisps of the Orion Nebula
18.09.2005
The Great Nebula in Orion, an immense, nearby starbirth region, is probably the most famous of all astronomical nebulas. Here, glowing gas surrounds hot young stars at the edge of an immense interstellar molecular cloud only 1500 light-years away. In the above deep image, faint wisps and sheets of dust and gas are particularly evident.
The Shadow of Phobos
17.09.2005
(xxxedit and linkxxx) Hurtling through space above the Red Planet, potato-shaped Phobos completes an orbit of Mars in less than eight hours. In fact, since its orbital period is shorter than the planet...
Northern Lights, September Skies
16.09.2005
So far, the Aurora Borealis or Northern Lights have made some remarkable visits to September's skies. The reason, of course, is the not-so-quiet Sun. In particular, a large solar active region now crossing...
The Nucleus of Comet Tempel 1
15.09.2005
Approaching the nucleus of comet Tempel 1 at ten kilometers per second, the Deep Impact probe's targeting camera recorded a truly dramatic series of images. Successive pictures improve in resolution and have been...
The Boomerang Nebula in Polarized Light
14.09.2005
Why did the Boomerang Nebula form? The symmetric cloud dubbed the Boomerang appears to have been created by a high-speed wind of gas and dust blowing from an aging central star at speeds of nearly 600,000 kilometers per hour.
A Quadruple Sky Over Great Salt Lake
13.09.2005
This was a sky to show the kids. All in all, three children, three planets, the Moon, a star, an airplane and a mom were all captured in one image near Great Salt Lake in Utah, USA on September 6.
The Colliding Galaxies of NGC 520
12.09.2005
Is this one galaxy or two? The jumble of stars, gas, and dust that is NGC 520 is now thought to incorporate the remains of two separate galaxies. A combination of observations and simulations indicate the NGC 520 is actually the collision of two disk galaxies.
Jupiters Clouds from Cassini
11.09.2005
Gas giant Jupiter is the solar system's largest world with about 320 times the mass of planet Earth. Famous for its Great Red Spot, Jupiter is also known for its regular, equatorial cloud bands, visible in very modest sized telescopes.
Supernova Survivor
10.09.2005
Beginning with a full view of beautiful spiral galaxy M81, follow the insets (left, bottom, then right) to zoom in on a real survivor. Seen at the center of the final field on the right is a star identified as the survivor of a cosmic cataclysm -- the supernova explosion of its companion star.
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