Sunrise Analemma
19.03.2003

Astronomically speaking, at the Equinox on March 21, 01:00 UT (March 20, 8:00 PM ET) the season changes. For this Equinox the Sun rises due east as it crosses the celestial equator heading north. In celebration, consider this spectacular sunrise analemma!

Hale-Bopp on Schedule
25.07.1996

Late March and early April of 1996 marked a banner season for viewing the spectacular naked-eye comet Hyakutake. The spring of 1997 could well offer a similar cometary wonder, Comet Hale-Bopp. Discovered last year while approaching the inner solar sytem Hale-Bopp has been eagerly watched for signs that it will indeed brighten spectacularly.

Shadows at the Lunar South Pole
23.04.2011

What is it? It's a multi-temporal illumination map, of course. To make it, the wide angle camera on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft collected 1,700 images over a period of 6 lunar days (6 Earth months), repeatedly covering an area centered on the Moon's south pole.

Particle Sizes in Saturns Rings
25.05.2005

What size particles compose Saturn's rings? To help find out, the robot Cassini spacecraft now orbiting Saturn broadcast radio waves of three different wavelengths right through the rings to Earth earlier this month.

Mars: Just The Facts
27.06.1997

Mars, the freeze-dried planet, orbits 137 million miles from the Sun or at about 1.5 times the Earth-Sun distance. It has two diminutive moons, towering extinct volcanos, an immense canyon system, a thin atmosphere...

Proxima Centauri: The Closest Star
17.01.2016

Does the closest star to our Sun have planets? No one is sure -- but you can now follow frequent updates of a new search that is taking place during the first few months of this year. The closest star, Proxima Centauri, is the nearest member of the Alpha Centauri star system.

A Crescent Earth at Midnight
21.06.2003

The Earth's northern hemisphere is outlined as a sunlit crescent in this dramatic view from orbit, recorded near local midnight by the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-8) on June 22, 1996. That...

Martian Crater Shows Evidence of Dried Pond
3.06.1998

Did a pond once exist in this Martian crater? Recent photographs by the spacecraft Mars Global Surveyor, currently in orbit around Mars, show features unusual for Mars yet similar to a dried pond on Earth.

A Prominent Solar Prominence from SOHO
30.03.2004

One of the most spectacular solar sights is a prominence. A solar prominence is a cloud of solar gas held above the Sun's surface by the Sun's magnetic field. Last month, NASA's Sun-orbiting SOHO spacecraft imaged an impressively large prominence hovering over the surface, pictured above.

A Prominent Solar Prominence from SOHO
14.03.2009

What's happened to our Sun? It was sporting a spectacular -- but not very unusual -- solar prominence. A solar prominence is a cloud of solar gas held above the Sun's surface by the Sun's magnetic field.