Giant Cluster Bends, Breaks Images
7.08.2004

What are those strange blue objects? Many are images of a single, unusual, beaded, blue, ring-like galaxy which just happens to line-up behind a giant cluster of galaxies. Cluster galaxies here appear yellow and -- together with the cluster's dark matter -- act as a gravitational lens.

Titan s Odd Spot
27.05.2005

Titan's odd spot could be a cloud, but if so, it's a persistent one. Peering into the thick, hazy atmosphere of Saturn's largest moon, cameras on board the Cassini spacecraft found a bright spot at the same location during Titan encounters in 2005 and 2004.

Seven Dusty Sisters
28.05.2018

Is this really the famous Pleaides star cluster? Known for its iconic blue stars, the Pleaides is shown here in infrared light where the surrounding dust outshines the stars. Here three infrared colors have been mapped into visual colors (R=24, G=12, B=4.6 microns).

Surrounded by Mars
18.09.2001

Just after landing on Mars in 1997, the robotic Mars Pathfinder main station took a quick first look around. This insurance panorama was taken even before the Sagan Memorial Station camera was raised to its two-meter-high perch. The full view is best seen by slowly scrolling to the right.

Odyssey at Mars
25.10.2001

After an interplanetary journey lasting 200 days, the Mars Odyssey spacecraft has entered orbit around the Red Planet. This latest success is welcome as in the past, Mars has often seemed a difficult planet to visit.

A Spiral Galaxy Gallery
9.04.1996

A progression of beautiful spiral galaxies is illustrated above with three photographs from NASA's Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (UIT). Flying above the Earth's obscuring layer of atmosphere on the Space Shuttle Columbia during...

Big Mars from Hubble
27.08.2003

At about 10 am Universal Time today, Mars and Earth will pass closer than in nearly 60,000 years. Mars, noticeably red, will be the brightest object in the eastern sky just after sunset.

Canis Major Dwarf: A New Closest Galaxy
17.11.2003

What is the closest galaxy to the Milky Way? The new answer to this old question is the Canis Major dwarf galaxy. For many years astronomers thought the Large Magellan Cloud (LMC) was closest, but its title was supplanted in 1994 by the Sagittarius dwarf galaxy.

NGC 6302: Big Bright Bug Nebula
5.05.2004

The bright clusters and nebulae of planet Earth's night sky are often named for flowers or insects, and NGC 6302 is no exception. With an estimated surface temperature of about 250,000 degrees...

Spooky Star Forming Region DR 6
1.11.2004

How could stars form such a spooky and familiar shape as a human skull? First, the complex process of star formation creates nebulas of many shapes and sizes -- it is human perception that identifies the skull shape.