A Full Sky Multi Colored Auroral Corona
9.11.2004

On some nights the sky is the most interesting show in town. This fisheye picture captures a particularly active and colorful auroral corona that occurred two days ago over l'Observatoire de la Decouverte in Val Belair near Quebec, Canada.

APOD: 2024 December 23 Б Christmas Tree Aurora
23.12.2024

It was December and the sky lit up like a Christmas tree. Shimmering, the vivid green, blue, and purple auroral colors that formed the tree-like apparition were caused by high atmospheric oxygen and nitrogen reacting to a burst of incoming electrons.

NGC 3603: An Active Star Cluster
18.10.1999

NGC 3603 is home to a massive star cluster, thick dust pillars, and a star about to explode. The central open cluster contains about 2000 bright stars, each of which is much brighter and more massive than our Sun.

Sun with Solar Flare
13.04.2013

This week the Sun gave up its strongest solar flare so far in 2013, accompanied by a coronal mass ejection (CME) headed toward planet Earth. A false-color composite image in extreme ultraviolet light from the Solar Dynamics Observatory captures the moment, recorded on April 11 at 0711 UTC. The flash, a moderate, M6.

Sunspots and Solar Active Regions
1.08.2002

July was a good month for sunspots ... really big sunspots. In fact, the full disk and inset pictures above show three large groups of spots, photographed only a few days ago on July 28. Together the sunspots span a region about thirty times the diameter of planet Earth.

Seaside Moon Mirage
20.06.2009

This surprising view of the Full Moon rising on June 7 was captured with a telephoto lens from a seaside balcony near Nice, France. The orange Moon's dark markings and odd shape put the photographer in mind of an alien creature's face staring down at the passing ship.

Coronal Rain, Solar Storm
15.11.2000

In this picture, the Sun's surface is quite dark. A frame from a movie recorded on November 9th by the orbiting TRACE telescope, it shows coronal loops lofted over a solar active region.

Comet Hale Bopp in the Outer Solar System
26.03.2001

Whatever became of Comet Hale-Bopp? The brightest comet in recent years has continued into the outer Solar System and is now further from the Sun than Saturn. To the surprise of many, Comet Hale-Bopp is still active, continuing to spew gas, ice and dust particles out into space.

Solar Flare from a Sharper Sun
21.11.2014

Solar active region AR2192 was the largest recorded sunspot group of the last 24 years. Before rotating off the Earth-facing side of the Sun at the end of October, it produced a whopping six energetic X-class flares.

An Active Sunspot Viewed Sideways
2.04.2007

Why are there dark spots on the sun? Although noted for thousands of years, sunspots have been known for decades to be regions of the Sun that are slightly depressed and cooled by the Sun's complex and changing magnetic field.