M83: The Southern Pinwheel
15.01.2025

Beautiful and bright spiral galaxy M83 lies a some twelve million light-years away, near the southeastern tip of the very long constellation Hydra. Prominent spiral arms traced by dark dust lanes and blue star clusters lend this galaxy its popular name, The Southern Pinwheel.

Fermi s Gamma ray Pulsars
9.07.2009

Born in supernovae, pulsars are spinning neutron stars, collapsed stellar cores left from the death explosions of massive stars. Traditionally identified and studied by observing their regular radio pulsations, two dozen pulsars have now been detected at extreme gamma-ray energies by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope.

The Center of Globular Cluster Omega Centauri
10.10.2001

What is left over after stars collide? To help answer this question, astronomers have been studying the center of the most massive ball of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy. In the center of globular cluster Omega Centauri, stars are packed in 10,000 times more densely than near our Sun.

The Center of Globular Cluster Omega Centauri
14.09.2009

What is left over after stars collide? To help answer this question, astronomers have been studying the center of the most massive ball of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy. In the center of globular cluster Omega Centauri, stars are packed in 10,000 times more densely than near our Sun.

The Mysterious Rings of Supernova 1987A
4.03.2017

What's causing those odd rings in supernova 1987A? Thirty years ago, in 1987, the brightest supernova in recent history was seen in the Large Magellanic Cloud. At the center of the featured picture is an object central to the remains of the violent stellar explosion.

The Mysterious Rings of Supernova 1987A
26.02.2012

What's causing those odd rings in supernova 1987A? Twenty five years ago, in 1987, the brightest supernova in recent history was seen in the Large Magellanic Clouds. At the center of the above picture is an object central to the remains of the violent stellar explosion.

The Decade that Defined Star System
28.12.1999

As the 1990s began, the only planetary star system known was our own Solar System. The first extra-solar star system was discovered orbiting a pulsar in 1991. Slight changes in the precise arrival times of the pulses from the central small dense neutron star gave evidence of orbiting planets.

Gamma Ray Crab, Geminga
24.06.1995

What if you could "see" in gamma-rays? If you could, these two spinning neutron stars or pulsars would be among the brightest objects in the sky. This computer processed image shows the Crab Nebula pulsar (below and right of center) and the Geminga pulsar (above and left of center) in the "light" of gamma-rays.

M1: The Crab Nebula from NOT
20.09.2005

This is the mess that is left when a star explodes. The Crab Nebula, the result of a supernova seen in 1054 AD, is filled with mysterious filaments. The filaments are not only tremendously...

M1: The Crab Nebula
25.07.1995

In the year 1054 a star in the constellation of Taurus exploded in a spectacular supernova so bright it appeared to dominate the sky except for the Sun and Moon for many days. It left behind one of the most brilliant nebulae, listed first in Charles Messier's list of nebulous sky objects.