HH1/HH2: Star Jets
19.06.1997

A cloud of interstellar gas and dust collapses and a star is born. At its core temperatures rise, a nuclear furnace ignites, and a rotating dusty disk forms surrounding the newborn star. According...

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.

APOD: 2024 June 16 Б Animation: Black Hole Destroys Star
16.06.2024

What happens if a star gets too close to a black hole? The black hole can rip it apart -- but how? It's not the high gravitational attraction itself that's the problem -- it's the difference in gravitational pull across the star that creates the destruction.

The Bipolar Jets of KX Andromedae
5.12.2025

Blasting outward from variable star KX Andromedae, these stunning bipolar jets are 19 light-years long. Recently discovered, they are revealed in unprecedented detail in this deep telescopic image centered on KX And and composed from over 692 hours of combined image data.

Milky Way over Uruguayan Lighthouse
19.11.2019

Can a lighthouse illuminate a galaxy? No, but in the featured image, gaps in light emanating from the Jose Ignacio Lighthouse in Uruguay appear to match up nicely, although only momentarily and coincidently, with dark dust lanes of our Milky Way Galaxy. The bright dot on the right is the planet Jupiter.

The Voyagers Message in a Bottle
8.09.2007

Launched thirty years ago, NASA's Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft are now respectively 15 billion and 12.5 billion kilometers from the Sun, equivalent to about 14 and 11.5 light-hours distant. Still functioning, the Voyagers are being tracked and commanded through the Deep Space Network.

At the Edge of NGC 891
26.05.2012

This sharp cosmic portrait features NGC 891. The spiral galaxy spans about 100 thousand light-years and is seen almost exactly edge-on from our perspective. In fact, about 30 million light-years distant in the constellation Andromeda, NGC 891 looks a lot like our Milky Way.

APOD: 2025 February 19 Б HH 30: A Star System with Planets Now Forming
19.02.2025

How do stars and planets form? New clues have been found in the protoplanetary system Herbig-Haro 30 by the James Webb Space Telescope in concert with Hubble and the Earth-bound ALMA. The observations show, among other things, that large dust grains are more concentrated into a central disk where they can form planets.

The Voyagers' Message in a Bottle
31.08.2002

Launched twenty-five years ago, NASA's Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft are now over 10 billion kilometers from the Sun. Still operational, the Voyagers are being tracked and commanded through the Deep Space Network.

Edge on NGC 3628
20.06.2013

Sharp telescopic views of magnificent edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 3628 show a puffy galactic disk divided by dark dust lanes. Of course, this deep galactic portrait puts some astronomers in mind of its popular moniker, The Hamburger Galaxy.