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SKY
Fountains of Enceladus
Recent Cassini images of Saturn's moon Enceladus
backlit by the sun show the fountain-like sources of the
fine spray of material that towers over the south polar
region. The image was taken looking more or less
broadside at the "tiger stripe" fractures observed in earlier
Enceladus images. It shows discrete plumes of a variety
of apparent sizes above the limb of the moon.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Birth of a Planet
This artist's conception shows binary-star system HD 113766, where astronomers suspect a rocky Earth-like planet is forming around one of the stars. At approximately 10-16
million years old, astronomers suspect this star is at just the right age for forming rocky planets.
The brown ring of material circling closest to the central star depicts a huge belt of dusty material, more than 100 times as much as in our asteroid belt, or enough to build a
asteroid belt, or enough to build a Mars-size planet or larger. The rocky material in the belt represents the early stages of planet formation, when dust grains clump together to
form rocks, and rocks collide to form even more massive rocky bodies called planetesimals. The belt is located in the middle of the system's terrestrial habitable zone, or the
region around a star where liquid water could exist on any rocky planets that might form. Earth is located in the middle of our sun's terrestrial habitable zone. The white outer
ring shows a concentration of icy dust also detected in the system. This material is at the equivalent position of the asteroid belt in our solar system, but only contains about
one-sixth as much material as the inner ring. Astronomers say it is not clear from the Spitzer observations if anything is occurring in the icy belt, but they believe it could be a
source of water for the planet that grows from the inner warm ring.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Natal Microcosm
In the quest to better understand the birth of stars and the formation of new worlds, astronomers have used NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope to examine the massive stars
contained in a cloudy region called Sharpless 140. This cloud is a star-forming microcosm that exhibits, within a relatively small area, all of the classic manifestations of
stellar birth.
Sharpless 140 lies almost 3,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cepheus. At its heart is a cluster of three deeply embedded young stars, which are each several
thousand times brighter than the sun. Though they are strikingly visible in this image from Spitzer's infrared array camera, they are completely obscured in visible light,
buried within the core of the surrounding dust cloud.
The extreme youth of at least one of these stars is indicated by the presence of a stream of gas moving at high velocities. Such outflows are signatures of the processes
surrounding a star that is still gobbling up material as part of its formation.
The bright red bowl, or arc, seen in this image traces the outer surface of the dense dust cloud encasing the young stars. This arc is made up primarily of organic
compounds called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which glow on the surface of the cloud. Ultraviolet light from a nearby bright star outside of the image is "eating away"
at these molecules. Eventually, this light will destroy the dust envelope and the masked young stars will emerge.
Image credit: NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS
Esperanza Fire
The Esperanza Fire started on Oct. 26 in the dry brush near Palm Springs,
Calif. By the time it was contained 6 days later, the arson fire had consumed
40,200 acres, and destroyed 34 homes and 20 outbuildings. Racing through
grass, brush and timber, the blaze killed five firefighters and forced hundreds
to evacuate. In this ASTER image composite of visible and infrared bands,
burned areas are shown in shades of red, vegetation is green, brown
vegetation is brown and asphalt and concrete are blue-gray.
With its 14 spectral bands from the visible to the thermal infrared wavelength
region, and its high spatial resolution of 15 to 90 meters (about 50 to 300
feet), ASTER images Earth to map and monitor the changing surface of our
planet.
The broad spectral coverage and high spectral resolution of ASTER provides
scientists with critical information for surface mapping, and monitoring of
dynamic conditions and temporal change. Applications include monitoring
glacial advances and retreats; monitoring potentially active volcanoes;
identifying crop stress; evaluating wetlands; and, monitoring thermal pollution
monitoring.
Image credit: NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS and U.S./Japan ASTER
Science Team
Cone Nebula
Resembling a nightmarish beast rearing its head from a crimson sea, this
monstrous object is actually a pillar of gas and dust. Called the Cone Nebula
because of its conical shape in ground-based images, this giant pillar resides in a
turbulent star-forming region. Taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in April 002,
this image shows the upper 2.5 light-years of the nebula, a height that equals 23
million round trips to the moon. The entire nebula is 7 light years in length. The
Cone Nebula resides 2,500 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros.
Radiation from hot, young stars has slowly eroded the nebula over millions of
years. Ultraviolet light heats the edges of the dark cloud, releasing gas into the
relatively empty region of surrounding space. There, additional ultraviolet radiation
causes the hydrogen gas to glow, which produces the red halo of light seen around
the pillar. A similar process occurs on a much smaller scale to gas surrounding a
single star, forming the bow-shaped arc seen near the upper left side of the Cone.
This arc is 65 times larger than the diameter of our solar system. The blue-white
light from surrounding stars is reflected by dust. Background stars can be seen
peeking through the evaporating tendrils of gas, while the turbulent base is
pockmarked with stars reddened by dust. Over time, only the densest regions of
the Cone will be left. Inside these regions, stars and planets may form.
The Cone Nebula is a cousin of the M16 pillars, which the Hubble imaged in 1995.
Monstrous pillars of cold gas like the Cone and M16 are common in large regions
of star birth. Astronomers believe the pillars are incubators for developing stars.
Image credit: NASA, H. Ford (JHU), G. Illingworth (UCSC/LO), M. Clampin (STScI),
G. Hartig (STScI), the ACS Science Team and ESA
Supernova Remnant
In the nearby galaxy known as the Small Magellanic Cloud, a massive star has exploded as a
supernova and begun to dissipate its interior into a spectacular display of colorful filaments,
reminiscent of fireworks display.
The supernova remnant (SNR), known as "E0102" for short, is the greenish-blue shell of debris just
below the center of this image from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. This delicate structure, glowing
a multitude of lavenders and peach hues, resides in the upper right of the image.
Determined to be only about 2,000 years old, E0102 is relatively young on astronomical scales and is
just beginning its interactions with the nearby interstellar medium. Young supernova remnants like
E0102 allow astronomers to examine material from the cores of massive stars directly. This in turn
gives insight on how stars form, their composition, and the chemical enrichment of the surrounding
area. As well, young remnants are a great learning tool to better understand the physics of supernova
explosions.
The Small Magellanic Cloud is a nearby dwarf galaxy to our own Milky Way. It is visible in the
Southern Hemisphere, in the direction of the constellation Tucana, and lies roughly 210,000 lightyears distant.
Image credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) and J. Green (University of
Colorado, Boulder)
String of Pearls
Saturn's fascinating meteorology manifests itself as a "string of pearls" formation, spanning more than 60,000
kilometers (37,000 miles).
Seen in new images acquired by Cassini's visual and infrared mapping spectrometer and lit from below by Saturn's
internal thermal glow, the bright "pearls" are actually clearings in Saturn's deep cloud system. More than two dozen
occur at 40 degrees north latitude. Each clearing follows another at a regular spacing of some 3.5 degrees in
longitude.
This is the first time such a regular and extensive train of cloud-clearings has been observed. The regularity indicates
that they may be a manifestation of a large planetary wave. Scientists plan to take more observations of this
phenomenon over the next few years to try to understand Saturn's deep circulation systems and meteorology. This
image was taken on April 27, 2006.
Stellar Nursery
NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope captured a glowing stellar nursery within a dark globule that reveals the birth of new protostars, or embryonic stars, and young stars never before
The Elephant's Trunk Nebula is an elongated dark globule within the emission nebula IC 1396 in the constellation of Cepheus. Within the globule, a half dozen newly discovered pr
are easily discernible as the bright red-tinted objects, mostly along the southern rim of the globule. These were previously undetected at visible wavelengths due to obscuration by
thick cloud ('globule body') and by dust surrounding the newly forming stars. The newborn stars form in the dense gas because of compression by the wind and radiation from a ne
massive star (located outside the field of view to the left). The winds from this unseen star are also responsible for producing the spectacular filamentary appearance of the globule
which resembles that of a flying dragon.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/W. Reach (SSC/Caltech
Flaming Star
This is a false-color image of the star AE Aurigae (bright source of light near the center of image) embedded in a region of space containing smoke-like
filaments of carbon-rich dust grains. Such dust might be hiding deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen, and stymieing astronomers' efforts to study star and
galaxy formation. NASA's Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) satellite has surveyed the local deuterium concentration in the galaxy and found
far more than expected. Because deuterium is a tracer of star and galaxy evolution, this discovery has the potential to radically alter theories about how
stars and galaxies form.
Image credit: T.A. Rector and B.A. Wolpa, NOAO, AURA and NSF
Crab Nebula
This composite image of the Crab Nebula shows x-ray (blue) and optical (red) superimposed.
Image credit: NASA/HST/CXC/ASU/J. Hester et al.
Extreme Planets
This artist's concept depicts the pulsar planet system discovered by Aleksander Wolszczan in 1992. Wolszczan used the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico to find three
planets - the first of any kind ever found outside our solar system - circling a pulsar named PSR B1257+12. Pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars, which are the collapsed
cores of exploded massive stars. They spin and pulse with radiation, much like a lighthouse beacon. Here, the pulsar's twisted magnetic fields are highlighted by the blue glow.
All three pulsar planets are shown in this picture; the farthest two from the pulsar (closest in this view) are about the size of Earth. Radiation from charged pulsar particles
would probably rain down on the planets, causing their night skies to light up with auroras similar to our Northern Lights. One such aurora is illustrated on the planet at the
bottom of the picture.
Since this landmark discovery, more than 160 extrasolar planets have been observed around stars that are burning nuclear fuel. The planets spotted by Wolszczan are still
the only ones around a dead star. They also might be part of a second generation of planets, the first having been destroyed when their star blew up. The Spitzer Space
Telescope's discovery of a dusty disk around a pulsar might represent the beginnings of a similarly "reborn" planetary system.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Cosmic Tornado
Light-years in length, this cosmic
tornado is actually a powerful jet
cataloged as HH (Herbig-Haro)
49/50. Though such energetic
outflows are well known to be
associated with the formation of
young stars, the exact cause of the
spiraling structures apparent in this
case is still mysterious. The
embryonic star responsible for the
62 mile per second jet is located
just off the top of the picture, while
the bright star seen near the tip of
the jet may just by chance lie along
the line of sight. HH49/50 is about
450 light-years distant, located in
the Chamaeleon I molecular cloud.
Image Credit: NASA/JPLCaltech/J. Bally (Univ. of Colorado)
et al.
Quintuplet Cluster
Penetrating 25,000 light-years of obscuring dust and myriad stars, the Hubble Space Telescope has provided the clearest view yet of one of the largest young clusters
of stars inside our Milky Way galaxy, located less than 100 light-years from the very center of the Galaxy. Having the equivalent mass greater than 10,000 stars like
our sun, the monster cluster is ten times larger than typical young star clusters scattered throughout our Milky Way. It is destined to be ripped apart in just a few million
years by gravitational tidal forces in the galaxy's core. But in its brief lifetime it shines more brightly than any other star cluster in the Galaxy. The 4-million-year-old
Quintuplet Cluster also is home to the brightest star seen in the galaxy, the so-called Pistol star.
Image Credit: NASA
Oresund Bridge
In 1991, the governments of Denmark and Sweden agreed to build a bridge to connect the
two countries across the Oresund Strait. The 16-kilometer-long Oresund Link between
Malmo, Sweden (right), and Copenhagen, Denmark (left), was completed and opened to
traffic in 2000. Denmark and Sweden were linked once more 7,000 years after rising sea
levels accompanying the end of the Ice Age severed the dry-land connection between the
two.
The Oresund Link has three main segments. On the Denmark side, the link begins with a
3,510-meter (2.2-mile) underwater tunnel. The tunnel emerges from the water onto a
roadway on a 4,055-meter (2.5-mile) artificial island, Peberholm, which appears as a bright
white shape to the south of the natural island in the scene. The cable-supported Oresund
Bridge stretches 7,845 meters (4.9 miles) across the eastern part of the Strait toward
Sweden, making a thin white line across the image.
Deep water appears dark blue, shallow water appears bright blue, vegetation appears
green, and developed or paved areas appear white. Several white specks in the waters of
the Strait are boats or ships.
Image Credit: NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS, and U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team
Bogda Mountains
The Turpan Depression, nestled at the foot of Chinas Bogda Mountains, is a strange mix of salt lakes and sand dunes. It is one of the few landscapes in the world that lies
below sea level.
This image was acquired by Landsat 7s Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus (ETM+) sensor.
Image Credit: NASA/USGS
Viewing Earth
This computer generated image depicts a view of Earth as seen from the surface of the asteroid Toutatis on Nov. 29, 1996. Toutatis currently approaches Earth once every four
years, and on Nov. 29th, 1996 was 5.2 million kilometers (3.3 million miles) away.
Image Credit: NASA
Tibetan Braid
This view of Tibets Brahmaputra River was taken on Oct. 13, 2000, by the Expedition 3 crew. This Asian river
carves a narrow west-east valley between the Tibetan Plateau to the north and the Himalaya Mountains to
the south, as it rushes eastward for more than 1,500 km in southwestern China. This area pictured is a 15km stretch south of the ancient Tibetan capital of Lhasa where the river flow becomes intricately braided as it
works and reworks its way through extensive deposits of erosional material.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute
Stephans Quintet
This false-color composite image of the Stephans Quintet galaxy cluster clearly shows one of the largest shock waves ever seen (green arc). The wave was produced by one
galaxy falling toward another at speeds of more than one million miles per hour. The image is made up of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and a ground-based
telescope in Spain.
Four of the five galaxies in this picture are involved in a violent collision, which has already stripped most of the hydrogen gas from the interiors of the galaxies. The centers of
the galaxies appear as bright yellow-pink knots inside a blue haze of stars, and the galaxy producing all the turmoil, NGC7318b, is the left of two small bright regions in the
middle right of the image. One galaxy, the large spiral at the bottom left of the image, is a foreground object and is not associated with the cluster.
The titanic shock wave, larger than our own Milky Way galaxy, was detected by the ground-based telescope using visible-light wavelengths. It consists of hot hydrogen gas. As
NGC7318b collides with gas spread throughout the cluster, atoms of hydrogen are heated in the shock wave, producing the green glow.
Stephan's Quintet is located 300 million light-years away in the Pegasus constellation.
For more information, visit the Planetary Photojournal
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Max Planck Institute
Our Sun
Our Sun
Extreme Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (EIT) image of a huge, handle-shaped prominence taken on Sept. 14,1999 taken in the 304 angstrom wavelength - Prominences are
huge clouds of relatively cool dense plasmasuspended in the Sun's hot, thin corona. At times, they can erupt,escaping the Sun's atmosphere. Emission in this spectral line
shows theupper chromosphere at a temperature of about 60,000 degrees K. Everyfeature in the image traces magnetic field structure. The hottest areasappear almost white,
while the darker red areas indicate coolertemperatures. Courtesy of SOHO/Extreme Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (EIT) consortium. SOHO is a project of international
cooperation between ESA and NASA.