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.

Little Planet Astro Camp
1.09.2016

Day and night on this little planet look a lot like day and night on planet Earth. In fact, the images used to construct the little planet projection, a digitally warped and stitched mosaic covering 360x180 degrees, were taken during day and night near Tarján, Hungary, planet Earth.

Sharpless 249 and the Jellyfish Nebula
22.03.2018

Normally faint and elusive, the Jellyfish Nebula is caught in this alluring telescopic image. Centered in the scene it's anchored right and left by two bright stars, Mu and Eta Geminorum, at the foot of the celestial twin. The Jellyfish Nebula is the brighter arcing ridge of emission with dangling tentacles.

APOD: 2026 January 27 Б Orions Treasures over Snowy Mountains
26.01.2026

Rising over a frozen valley in the Tatra Mountains, the familiar stars and nebulas of Orion dominate this wide-field nightscape. The featured deep photo was taken in southern Poland's highest mountain range last month, where dark skies and alpine terrain combined to reveal both Earth's rugged beauty and the structure of our galaxy.

Flowing Barchan Sand Dunes on Mars
22.04.2012

When does Mars act like a liquid? Although liquids freeze and evaporate quickly into the thin atmosphere of Mars, persistent winds may make large sand dunes appear to flow and even drip like a liquid.

Stargate Milky Way
16.08.2022

There is a huge gate of stars in the sky, and you pass through it twice a day. The stargate is actually our Milky Way Galaxy, and it is the spin of the Earth that appears to propel you through it.

The Flash Spectrum of the Sun
11.03.2016

In a flash, the visible spectrum of the Sun changed from absorption to emission on March 9 during the total solar eclipse. That fleeting moment, at the beginning the total eclipse phase, is captured by telephoto lens and diffraction grating in this image from clearing skies over Ternate, Indonesia.

Cassini To Venus
16.10.1997

NASA's Saturn Explorer Cassini with ESA's Titan Probe Huygens attached successfully rocketed into the skies early yesterday morning. The mighty Titan 4B Centaur rocket is seen here across the water gracefully arcing away from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Station.

The Andromeda Galaxy in Infrared
20.10.2005

What is the Andromeda galaxy really like? To find out, astronomers looked at our largest galactic neighbor in a different light: infrared. Astronomers trained the orbiting Spitzer Space Telescope at the Messier monster (M31) for over 18 hours, creating a mosaic that incorporated 11,000 separate exposures.

50 Years Ago: Freedom 7 Flies
5.05.2011

Fifty years ago, near the dawn of the space age, NASA controllers "lit the candle" and sent Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard arcing into space atop a Redstone rocket. His cramped space capsule was dubbed Freedom 7.