Venus and Jupiter are Close
2.07.2015

On June 30, Venus and Jupiter were close in western skies at dusk. Near the culmination of this year's gorgeous conjunction, the two bright evening planets are captured in the same telescopic field of view in this image taken after sunset from Bejing, China.

The Car, the Hole, and the Peekskill Meteorite
19.11.2006

The Peekskill meteor of 1992 was captured on 16 independent videos and then struck a car. Documented as brighter than the full Moon, the spectacular fireball crossed parts of several US states during its 40 seconds of glory before landing in Peekskill, New York.

Sunset to Sunrise over the Baltic Sea
16.06.2023

This serene view from the coast of Sweden looks across the Baltic sea and compresses time, presenting the passage of one night in a single photograph. From sunset to sunrise, moonlight illuminates the creative sea and skyscape. Fleeting clouds, fixed stars, and flowing northern lights leave their traces in planet Earth's sky.

Star Cluster M34
11.02.2010

This pretty open cluster of stars, M34, is about the size of the Full Moon on the sky. Easy to appreciate in small telescopes, it lies some 1,800 light-years away in the constellation Perseus. At that distance, M34 physically spans about 15 light-years.

The Veil Nebula Unveiled
6.12.2005

These wisps of gas are all that remain visible of a Milky Way star. Many thousands of years ago that star exploded in a supernova leaving the Veil Nebula, pictured above. At the time...

Moonset, Planet Earth
28.10.2000

During the Astro-1 astronomy mission of December, 1990, Space Shuttle astronauts photographed this stunning view of the full moon rising above the Earth's limb. In the foreground, towering clouds of condensing water vapor mark the extent of the troposphere, the lowest layer of the planet's life-sustaining atmosphere.

Leonids Over Ayers Rock
30.10.2002

Will this year's Leonid meteor shower be as good as last year's? No one knows for sure. Possibly, however, in the waning nighttime hours of November 18 and lasting throughout much of November 19, sky gazers across the globe may get their last chance ever to see a meteor storm.

Nearby Spiral M33
2.12.2002

Spiral galaxy M33 is a mid-sized member of our Local Group of Galaxies. M33 is also called the Triangulum Galaxy for the constellation in which it resides. About four times smaller (in radius) than...

IC 4628: The Prawn Nebula
4.07.2016

South of Antares, in the tail of the nebula-rich constellation Scorpius, lies emission nebula IC 4628. Nearby hot, massive stars, millions of years young, radiate the nebula with invisible ultraviolet light, stripping electrons from atoms. The electrons eventually recombine with the atoms to produce the visible nebular glow, dominated by the red emission of hydrogen.

Tarantula
4.06.1997

NGC 2070 is an immense star forming region in a nearby galaxy known as the Large Magellanic Cloud. Its spidery appearance is responsible for its popular name, "The Tarantula Nebula", except that this tarantula is about 1,000 light-years across, and 165,000 light-years away in the southern constellation Dorado.