The Cat's Eye Nebula
1.11.1998

Three thousand light years away, a dying star throws off shells of glowing gas. This image from the Hubble Space Telescope reveals The Cat's Eye Nebula to be one of the most complex planetary nebulae known.

CG4: A Ruptured Cometary Globule
13.05.2014

Can a gas cloud grab a galaxy? It's not even close. The "claw" of this odd looking "creature" in the above photo is a gas cloud known as a cometary globule. This globule, however, has ruptured. Cometary globules are typically characterized by dusty heads and elongated tails.

X Rays From Antennae Galaxies
3.02.2004

A bevy of black holes and neutron stars shine as bright, point-like sources against bubbles of million degree gas in this false-color x-ray image from the orbiting Chandra Observatory. The striking picture spans about...

NGC 6240: When Galaxies Collide
28.12.1995

Sometimes even galaxies can suffer a fatal attraction. Here gravity causes two galaxies to collide in a spectacular display of energetic gas, dust, and light. When galaxies collide it is rare that any stars in the galaxies themselves collide, or that any change will be seen in a human lifetime.

The Weather on Neptune
28.10.1996

Today's weather on Neptune will be typical. Highs in the upper atmosphere will be about -150 Centigrade, with winds ranging about 900 miles per hour near the equator. Much was learned recently about Neptune's weather by the release last week of time-lapse pictures of the most distant gas giant in our Solar System.

Elliptical Galaxy M87
20.05.2006

In spiral galaxies, majestic winding arms of young stars and interstellar gas and dust rotate in a flat disk around a bulging galactic nucleus. But elliptical galaxies seem to be simpler. Lacking gas and dust to form new stars, their randomly swarming older stars, give them an ellipsoidal (egg-like) shape.

Stars, Dust and Nebula in NGC 6559
2.08.2009

When stars form, pandemonium reigns. A textbook case is the star forming region NGC 6559. Visible above are red glowing emission nebulas of hydrogen, blue reflection nebulas of dust, dark absorption nebulas of dust, and the stars that formed from them.

Dark Matter, X rays, and NGC 720
26.10.2002

Elliptical galaxy NGC 720 is enveloped in a cosmic cloud of x-ray emitting gas. Seen in this false color image from the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the extreme temperature of the gas - about 7 million...

NGC 2392: Double Shelled Planetary Nebula
16.02.2020

To some, this huge nebula resembles a person's head surrounded by a parka hood. In 1787, astronomer William Herschel discovered this unusual planetary nebula: NGC 2392. More recently, the Hubble Space Telescope imaged the nebula in visible light, while the nebula was also imaged in X-rays by the Chandra X-ray Observatory.

CG4: A Ruptured Cometary Globule
6.08.2007

Can a gas cloud eat a galaxy? It's not even close. The odd looking "creature" or "hand" extending down from the top of the above photo is a gas cloud known as a cometary globule. This globule, however, has ruptured. Cometary globules are typically characterized by dusty heads and elongated tails.