APOD: 2024 April 23 Б Contrail Shadow X
23.04.2024

What created this giant X in the clouds? It was the shadow of contrails illuminated from below. When airplanes fly, humid engine exhaust may form water droplets that might freeze in Earth's cold upper atmosphere. These persistent streams of water and ice scatter light from the Sun above and so appear bright from below.

A Sharper View of a Hazy Giant
6.11.2008

This dramatic image of Jupiter is touted as the sharpest picture of the entire gas giant ever taken from the ground. The picture was made using a prototype instrument known as MAD (Multi-conjugate Adaptive optics Demonstrator) mounted on one of the European Southern Observatory's 8-meter diameter Very Large Telescope units in Chile.

Gemini s Meteors
17.12.2020

Taken over the course of an hour shortly after local midnight on December 13, 35 exposures were used to create this postcard from Earth. The composited night scene spans dark skies above the snowy Italian Dolomites during our fair planet's annual Geminid meteor shower.

South Pacific Shadowset
24.08.2024

The full Moon and Earth's shadow set together in this island skyscape. The alluring scene was captured Tuesday morning, August 20, from Fiji, South Pacific Ocean, planet Earth. For early morning risers shadowset in the western sky is a daily apparition.

Unusual Aurora During Solar Wind Dropout
23.12.1999

On May 10, for some unknown reason, the Solar Wind virtually stopped. Normally our Sun emits a wind of between five and ten energetic particles per cubic centimeter moving outward at about 500 kilometers per second.

The Milky Way over Utah
1.08.2006

If sometimes it appears that the entire Milky Way Galaxy is raining down on your head, do not despair. It happens twice a day. As the Sun rises in the East, wonders of the night sky become less bright than the sunlight scattered by our own Earth's atmosphere, and so fade from view.

Shadow Set
27.01.2005

A nearly full Moon and planet Earth's shadow set together in this scene captured Monday from snowy Mt. Jelm, home of the Wyoming Infrared Observatory. For early morning risers (and late...

The Orbiting Hubble Space Telescope
6.08.2001

The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is the largest orbiting public optical telescope in history. Its 2.4 meter diameter reflecting mirror and its perch above Earth's atmosphere allow it to create exceptionally sharp images.

MAGIC NEOWISE
24.07.2020

The multi-mirror, 17 meter-diameter MAGIC telescopes reflect this starry night sky from the Roque de los Muchachos European Northern Observatory on the Canary Island of La Palma. MAGIC stands for Major Atmospheric Gamma Imaging...

APOD: 2024 February 28 Б Shades of Night
28.02.2024

How does the sky turn dark at night? In stages, and with different characteristic colors rising from the horizon. The featured image shows, left to right, increasingly late twilight times after sunset in 20 different vertical bands. The picture was taken last month in Syracuse, Sicily, Italy, in the direction opposite the Sun.