S is for Sun
21.03.2002

Taken yesterday from the SOHO spacecraft, this false-color image shows the active Sun near the March Equinox, the beginning of Fall in the south and Spring in the northern hemisphere. Recorded in a band...

Local Group Galaxy NGC 205
8.01.1996

The Milky Way Galaxy is not alone. It is part of a gathering of about 25 galaxies known as the Local Group. Members include the Great Andromeda Galaxy (M31), M32, M33, the Large Magellanic Clouds, the Small Magellanic Clouds, Dwingeloo 1, several small irregular galaxies, and many dwarf elliptical galaxies.

Galileo, Cassini, and the Great Red Spot
2.08.1996

Imagine a hurricane that lasted for 300 years! Jupiter's Great Red Spot indeed seems to be a giant hurricane-like storm system rotating with the Jovian clouds. Observed in 1655 by Italian-French astronomer Jean-Dominique Cassini it is seen here over 300 years later - still going strong - in a mosaic of recent Galileo spacecraft images.

X-Ray Pleiades
18.03.1997

The Pleiades star cluster is one of the jewels of the northern sky. To the unaided eye it appears as a lovely and tantalizing grouping of stars in the constellation of Taurus, while telescopic views reveal cluster stars surrounded by delicate blue wisps of dust-reflected starlight.

The Bubble
16.07.2004

Blown by the wind from a star, this tantalizing, ghostly apparition is cataloged as NGC 7635, but known simply as The Bubble Nebula. Astronomer Ken Crawford's striking view combines a long exposure through a hydrogen alpha filter with color images to reveal the intricate details of this cosmic bubble and its environment.

Leo A: Nearby Dwarf Irregular Galaxy
10.11.2004

Why isn't this small galaxy simple? The above image and contemporary observations of small nearby galaxy Leo A were supposed to show it has a simple structure. Now Leo A is known...

1999 JM8: A Rock Too Close
1.09.1999

Nearly four kilometers across, the huge rock known as 1999 JM8 silently passed only 8.5 million kilometers from the Earth in early August. The small asteroid was completely unknown before May. Every few centuries, a rock like this impacts the Earth, with the potential to disrupt modern civilization.

VERITAS and Venus
8.11.2007

Early morning risers and late to bed astronomers have recently enjoyed bright planets in predawn skies, with brilliant Venus above the eastern horizon. On November 5, Venus was joined by the waning crescent Moon.

Saturns Rings from the Other Side
9.06.2008

What do Saturn's rings look like from the other side? From Earth, we usually see Saturn's rings from the same side of the ring plane that the Sun illuminates them. Geometrically...

The Colors of IC 1795
10.12.2009

This colorful cosmic portrait features glowing gas and dark dust clouds in IC 1795, a star forming region in the northern constellation Cassiopeia. The nebula's colors were created by adopting the Hubble false-color...