Dwarf Galaxies in the Coma Cluster
31.05.2007

In visible light images, over a thousand galaxies are seen to lie within a volume about 20 million light-years across in the rich Coma Galaxy Cluster. But infrared images of the Coma Cluster have now been used to add thousands more to the Coma's galaxy count in the form of previously undiscovered dwarf galaxies.

Small Worlds Ceres and Vesta
22.06.2007

Ceres and Vesta are, respectively, only around 950 kilometers and 530 kilometers in diameter - about the size of Texas and Arizona. But they are two of the largest of over 100,000 minor bodies orbiting in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Carina Nebula Panorama from Hubble
24.05.2009

In one of the brightest parts of Milky Way lies a nebula where some of the oddest things occur. NGC 3372, known as the Great Nebula in Carina, is home to massive stars and changing nebula.

Bright Planets at McMath Pierce Solar Telescope
16.03.2012

Bright planets Venus and Jupiter are framed by the National Solar Observatory's McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope in this very astronomical scene. The photo was taken at Kitt Peak National Observatory on March 9.

Enhanced Color Caloris
4.03.2015

The sprawling Caloris basin on Mercury is one of the solar system's largest impact basins, created during the early history of the solar system by the impact of a large asteroid-sized body.

Planetary Nebula Mz3: The Ant Nebula
25.04.2015

Why isn't this ant a big sphere? Planetary nebula Mz3 is being cast off by a star similar to our Sun that is, surely, round. Why then would the gas that is streaming away create an ant-shaped nebula that is distinctly not round?

Ancient Ogunquit Beach on Mars
7.05.2017

This was once a beach -- on ancient Mars. The featured 360-degree panorama, horizontally compressed, was taken by the robotic Curiosity rover currently exploring the red planet. Named Ogunquit Beach after its terrestrial counterpart, evidence...

APOD: 2024 May 26 Б A Solar Filament Erupts
25.05.2024

What's happened to our Sun? Nothing very unusual -- it just threw a filament. Toward the middle of 2012, a long standing solar filament suddenly erupted into space, producing an energetic coronal mass ejection (CME).

APOD: 2025 June 24 Б In the Center of Spiral Galaxy M61
23.06.2025

Is there a spiral galaxy in the center of this spiral galaxy? Sort of. Image data from the Hubble Space Telescope, the European Southern Observatory, and smaller telescopes on planet Earth are combined in this detailed portrait of face-on spiral galaxy Messier 61 (M61) and its bright center.

APOD: 2025 December 8 Б Flying Over the Earth at Night
7.12.2025

Many wonders are visible when flying over the Earth at night. Such visual spectacles occur every day for astronauts in low Earth orbit, but the featured video captured several from the International Space Station (ISS) in 2011 and set them to rousing music.