# Space images thread



## Drone (Dec 18, 2012)

> The *Crab Nebula* (M1, NGC 1952 or Taurus A) lies ~6500 ly away from Earth and is the remnant of a dramatic explosion, called a supernova, originally seen by Chinese Astronomers in 1054 AD. Starting out at 12-15 times more massive than the Sun, all that was left after the dramatic death of the star is a tiny, rapidly rotating neutron star and a complex network of ejected stellar material.











> Previous infrared images of the Crab Nebula, using the Spitzer Space Telescope, used much shorter wavelengths and so only showed the warmer dust. Spitzer found only a tiny amount of dust, simply because it missed the massive reservoir of colder dust now known to exist. Herschel, observing at longer wavelengths, is able to detect both warm dust (shown in green/blue in the image) and also cool dust (shown as yellow/orange), some as cold as *-260 Celsius*. This has allowed astronomers to measure the total mass of dust for the first time.



It's amazing that Herschel Space Observatory managed to get such details which Spitzer Space Telescope and Hubble couldn't. 
There's enough dust to make around 30 000 - 40 000 Earths. 
We can see these filaments of dust in the far-infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum (right part of the image).


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## lyndonguitar (Dec 18, 2012)

Looks beautiful!

6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?


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## Drone (Dec 18, 2012)

lyndonguitar said:


> Looks beautiful!
> 
> 6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?



Ancient Chinese saw that explosion in 1054 AD  It was so bright that you could easily read a book in the nighttime 

So let's do some math: distance is 6500 ly and Chinese saw that in 1054 AD. It means it happened much much earlier.


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## 3870x2 (Dec 18, 2012)

lyndonguitar said:


> Looks beautiful!
> 
> 6500 light years away... so what we are seeing has already happened 6500 years ago right?



Correct.



Drone said:


> Ancient Chinese saw that explosion in 1054 AD  It was so bright that you could easily read a book in the nighttime
> 
> So let's do some math: distance is 6500 ly and Chinese saw that in 1054 AD. It means it happened much much earlier.




Or so I thought.  Is there a reason that the light from the nebula would travel faster than light? or has the distance between us and the crab nebula expanded between now and 1054 AD?


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## Drone (Dec 18, 2012)

3870x2 said:
			
		

> Is there a reason that the light from the nebula would travel faster than light? or has the distance between us and the crab nebula expanded between now and 1054 AD?


They said that it was seen in 1054 and lasted for two years. What we see now is all the radiation that left after the explosion.

So I think *actual* explosion happened 6500 (distance) + 1054 (when it was observed) = 7554 years ago  I might be wrong


Lol here it says that Crab Nebula is 6000 ly away, gosh


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## Drone (Dec 18, 2012)

Some other goodness (brand new images) I wanna post here:















NGC 5189 is a planetary nebula that lies 1800 ly away in the southern constellation Musca. The gorgeous image above shows the glowing streamers of oxygen, sulfur and hydrogen that are being blown far into space from the hot star HD 117622 at its heart.

Ok now some other crazy stuff 






*Cygnus Loop*, the gaseous remains of a supernova that occurred 5000-10000 years ago, spans an area nearly 45 times the width of the full Moon in the sky. First noted in 1784 by William Herschel. This remnant is located 1500 ly away in the constellation Cygnus.

In the image, hydrogen alpha, sulphur, and oxygen ions correspond to the red, green, and blue color values, respectively. 

Picture above is a preview. Actual image is *One of the Largest Astronomical Images Ever Made* so if you've got balls click here. It's full-size 1.7 GB TIFF image (600 megapixels) ahahaha. Or you can see smaller versions here


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## Inceptor (Dec 19, 2012)

Drone said:


> They said that it was seen in 1054 and lasted for two years. What we see now is all the radiation that left after the explosion.
> 
> So I think *actual* explosion happened 6500 (distance) + 1054 (when it was observed) = 7554 years ago  I might be wrong



If the distance to the nebula is 6500 ly, then the blast actually took place 6500+958=7458 years ago realtime. And it was observed on Earth in 1054 (958 years ago).


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## rampage (Dec 19, 2012)

i was just looking at the crab nebula last night with my mew telescope, of course it was not a brilient at this but still i LOVED it along with jupiter and a few double stars that i had a good look at.

I have not done this sense my early teens, and i was texting my gf at midnight telling her every little thing i saw (she apreciated been woken up to hear all that)


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## HammerON (Dec 19, 2012)

More cool stuff Drone


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## Drone (Dec 19, 2012)

Inceptor said:


> If the distance to the nebula is 6500 ly, then the blast actually took place 6500+958=7458 years ago realtime. And it was observed on Earth in 1054 (958 years ago).


 Fair enough.



rampage said:


> i was just looking at the crab nebula last night with my mew telescope, of course it was not a brilient at this but still i LOVED it along with jupiter and a few double stars that i had a good look at.
> 
> I have not done this sense my early teens, and i was texting my gf at midnight telling her every little thing i saw (she apreciated been woken up to hear all that)


 That's sweet.



HammerON said:


> More cool stuff Drone


 Yeah and now more 


Here we have new image of Zeta Ophiuchi (bright blue star at center)








> Like a ship plowing through still waters, the giant star Zeta Ophiuchi is speeding through space, making waves in the dust ahead. Astronomers theorize that this star was once sitting pretty next to a companion star even heftier than itself. But when that star died in a fiery explosion, Zeta Ophiuchi was kicked away and sent flying. Zeta Ophiuchi, which is 20 times more massive and 80,000 times brighter than our sun, is racing along at about 54,000 mph (24 km/s).
> 
> As it charges through the dust, which appears green, fierce stellar winds push the material into waves. Where the waves are the most compressed, and the warmest, they appear red. This bow shock is analogous to the ripples that precede the bow of a ship as it moves through the water, or the pileup of air ahead of a supersonic airplane that results in a sonic boom.



Death of one star sent other star rushing through space with enormous speed... would you ever imagine that ...


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## Drone (Dec 20, 2012)

Crrrrrrrowd of stars  *NGC 6388*






This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows NGC 6388, a dynamically middle-aged globular cluster in the Milky Way. While the cluster formed in the distant past (like all globular clusters, it is over 10 billion years old), a study of the distribution of bright blue stars within the cluster shows that it has aged at a moderate speed, and its heaviest stars are in the process of migrating to the centre.


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## Drone (Dec 24, 2012)

Another cool pic taken by Hubble. A baby star.



> This image shows a newly-formed star called *S106 IR* (in the constellation Cygnus) shrouded in dust at the centre of the image, and responsible for the surrounding gas cloud's hourglass-like shape and the turbulence visible within. Light from glowing hydrogen is coloured blue in this image.



And here's video: 










Groovy.


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## Drone (Jan 8, 2013)

Cassiopea A


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## theubersmurf (Jan 8, 2013)

people alive in 1054 AD aren't exactly ancient.


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## RCoon (Jan 8, 2013)

Drone said:


> Some other goodness (brand new images) I wanna post here:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Reminds me of those awesome images you can compile with Apophysis


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## Cmdr. Thrawn (Jan 10, 2013)

Thank you for finding the great ones Drone!!!  It takes time to sift through all pictures of the heavens to find the best ones like these!


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## qubit (Jan 10, 2013)

Dammit Drone, you always find the cool astronomy.


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## Drone (Jan 10, 2013)

Thanks qubit  Here's more. A brand new image of the *Orion Nebula*. It's the sharpest and clearest image _ever_ obtained. Astronomers used new adaptive optics.







Here you can find more info about Orion, there's a flash animated movie


http://hubblesite.org/gallery/tours/tour-orion/


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## Drone (Jan 11, 2013)

A bunch of pics for today. No worries, only brand *new* hot and sexy images:






The heart of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1097






The globular cluster 47 Tucanae






Spiral galaxy M101 (the Pinwheel Galaxy)






An archetypal dwarf galaxy NGC 5477

http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/news/hires/2013/galexreveals.jpg

And finally ... giant barred spiral galaxy NGC 6872. It's the *largest known spiral galaxy*.

The spiral is ~ _522,000 ly_ across from the tip of one outstretched arm to the tip of the other, which makes it about *five times* the size of the Milky Way.

IC 4970, the small disk galaxy interacting with NGC 6872, is located above the spiral's central region.


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## micropage7 (Jan 12, 2013)

Drone said:


> A bunch of pics for today. No worries, only brand *new* hot and sexy images:
> 
> http://www.spacetelescope.org/static/archives/images/screen/potw1252a.jpg
> 
> ...



its beautiful 
and it makes me realize how small the world that we live in


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## Drone (Jan 16, 2013)

Brand new image of Lupus 3 (a dark cloud in the constellation of Scorpius, 600 ly from Earth)








> As the denser parts of such clouds contract under the effects of gravity they heat up and start to shine. At first this radiation is blocked by the dusty clouds and can only be observed at longer wavelengths than visible light, such as the infrared. But as the stars get hotter and brighter their intense radiation and stellar winds gradually clear the clouds around them until they emerge in all their glory.



Darkness creates the light. How fascinating.



> The bright stars right of the centre of this new picture form a perfect example of a small group of such hot young stars. Some of their brilliant blue light is being scattered off the remaining dust around them. The two brightest stars are bright enough to be seen easily with a small telescope or binoculars. They are young stars that have not yet started to shine by nuclear fusion in their cores and are still surrounded by glowing gas. They are probably less than one million years old.



Toddler stars, that's cute.


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## Drone (Jan 23, 2013)

New image of clouds of cosmic dust in the region of Orion.






The image shows the region around the reflection nebula NGC 1999 in visible light. While these dense interstellar clouds seem dark and obscured in visible-light observations, APEX’s LABOCA camera can detect the heat glow of the dust and reveal the hiding places where new stars are being formed.


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## Drone (Jan 29, 2013)

Two brand *new* eye-catching views the *Andromeda Galaxy (M31)* from the _Herschel space observatory_:











It's always great to see new pictures from space!



> Andromeda is the *nearest major galaxy* to our own Milky Way at a distance of *2.5 ly*, making it an ideal natural laboratory to study star formation and galaxy evolution.
> 
> Sensitive to the far-infrared light from cool dust mixed in with the gas, Herschel seeks out clouds of gas where stars are born. The new image reveals some of the very coldest dust in the galaxy - *only a few tens of degrees above absolute zero* - colored red in this image.
> 
> ...



You can download *high resolution* pics of Andromeda Galaxy below:

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA16682.tif

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA16681.tif


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## Drone (Feb 5, 2013)

*M106* is a spiral galaxy, located a little over 20 million ly away. At its heart, as in most spiral galaxies, is an active supermassive black hole.






A new sweeping image from NASA's WISE showing the tangle of clouds and stars that lie in *Orion's Sword*.






Image of NGC 1973, the *Running Man Nebula*, located roughly 1500 ly from Earth in the constellation of Orion.


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## Drone (Feb 8, 2013)

New cosmic images:






Wings of the Seagull Nebula






ESO 121-6 (galaxy)


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## lyndonguitar (Feb 8, 2013)

it looks beautiful


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## 3870x2 (Feb 8, 2013)

Does anyone wonder what out night sky might have looked like 4 billion years ago?

Due to the things in the universe having been closer to one another, I wonder how that would have affected the gravity on earth.  If you don't know, gravity is infinite, though decaying in distance.  Therefore having the universe closer together, you would have more things essentially "pulling" at you, essentially reversing some of the earths gravity.

Also, since it is earlier in the universe's life, galaxies would be less formed, and space would look more sporadic.  With the whole universe being quite a bit more compact at that point, there would be no night and day, only day of varying light sources.

Other stars would have been close enough that we would be able to see them almost like we see out sun, though quite a bit smaller in most cases.


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## Drone (Feb 20, 2013)

*Lobster Nebula*







Located around 8000 ly away in the constellation of Scorpius, NGC 6357 (Lobster Nebula) is a region filled with vast clouds of gas and tendrils of dark dust. These clouds are forming stars, including massive hot stars which glow a brilliant blue-white in visible light.


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## Drone (Feb 27, 2013)

It may look like something from The Lord of the Rings, but this fiery swirl is actually a planetary nebula known as ESO 456-67. This object lies in the constellation of Sagittarius (The Archer).






In this image, it is possible to see the various layers of material expelled by the central star. Each appears in a different hue - red, orange, yellow, and green-tinted bands of gas are visible, with clear patches of space at the heart of the nebula.


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## Ahhzz (Feb 27, 2013)

Drone said:


> ....
> 
> Death of one star sent other star rushing through space with enormous speed... would you ever imagine that ...



If I've read right, our sun is actually moving thru the galaxy at something like 550k mph, still that's impressive


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## Drone (Mar 4, 2013)

Cigar Galaxy (*M82*) is ~ 12 million ly away in Ursa Major. It's a starburst galaxy meaning it has a very high rate of new star formation. The galaxy is five times brighter than entire Milky Way  and produces stars 10 times faster.


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## droopyRO (Mar 4, 2013)

Subscribed, thank you.


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## Drone (Mar 8, 2013)

Universe is so beautiful and full of mysteries.



> PS1-12sk, the yellow dot at image center (circled), is classified as a very rare Type Ibn supernova - only the sixth such example found out of thousands of supernovae. It was discovered on the outskirts of a bright elliptical galaxy (the yellow blob to the upper left of the supernova) located ~ 780 million light-years from Earth. A Type Ibn supernova is thought to come from the explosion of a young, massive star. However, the site of the explosion shows no signs of recent star formation, and a supernova from a massive star has never before been seen in a galaxy of this type.


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## 1Kurgan1 (Mar 9, 2013)

Drone said:


> Ancient Chinese saw that explosion in 1054 AD  It was so bright that you could easily read a book in the nighttime
> 
> So let's do some math: distance is 6500 ly and Chinese saw that in 1054 AD. It means it happened much much earlier.



That would be the explosion itself happening much earlier. I think he just meant those images we are capturing now are 6500 years ago, which would be correct. The date of the explosion would be 6500 years before 1054 AD.


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## WhiteLotus (Mar 9, 2013)

I frigging love space


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## Alcpone (Mar 9, 2013)

Love these type of images. Would love Betelgeuse to go boom in my life time, fingers crossed ay


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## Drone (Mar 13, 2013)

A photo of spiral galaxies NGC 3169 and 3166. Shells, plumes, arcs of stars and even shared dust lanes are some of the features that highlight this very deep image.


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## R3DF13LD (Mar 13, 2013)

Nice Cosmic Images it makes me want to play freelancer again hahaha...


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## Drone (Mar 15, 2013)

Spiral galaxy *IC 5052*. The blue light marks pockets of extremely hot newborn stars.







Ring galaxy Zw II 28.



> Ring galaxies are thought to form when one galaxy slices through the disc of another, larger, one - as galaxies are mostly empty space, this collision is not as aggressive or as destructive as one might imagine. The likelihood of two stars physically colliding is minimal, and it is instead the gravitational effects of the two galaxies that causes the disruption. This disruption upsets the material in both galaxies, causing it to redistribute to form a dense central core, encircled by bright stars. All this commotion causes clouds of gas and dust to collapse and triggers new periods of intense star formation in the outer ring, which is thus full of hot, young, blue stars and regions that are actively giving rise to new stars.


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## Drone (Mar 25, 2013)

> The Elephant's Trunk Nebula (IC1396) is a cloud of gas and dust located 2400 ly from Earth in the constellation Cepheus. The Elephant Trunk is part of a larger region of ionized gas illuminated by a nearby massive O-type star (located outside the image to the left). Radiation and winds from this hot star compress and ionize the edges of cloud, resulting in the bright "ionization fronts" seen in this image. Young stars at very different stages of formation have been found both within and just outside the Elephant’s Trunk.



Download JPEG 8000 x 4000


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## Drone (Nov 20, 2013)

I will never let this thread die.






That's NGC 7497 galaxy






M81 & M82 galaxies

Galaxies in both images bathe in foreground dust. Think of it as a smudge on your window when you’re looking out at a distant mountain.


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## Drone (Nov 26, 2013)

A supernova that was witnessed by astronomer Tycho Brahe in 1572.
The explosion spewed elements like silicon and iron into space at speeds of more than 5000 km/s. When that ejecta rammed into surrounding interstellar gas, it created a shock wave -- the equivalent of a cosmic "sonic boom". This reverse shock wave racing inward at 1000 times the speed of sound is heating the remnant and causing it to emit X-ray light.






This image shows *Stephan’s Quintet* – NGC 7317, NGC 7318a, NGC 7318b and NGC 7319 – a compact group of galaxies located ~ 280 million ly away. A prominent foreground galaxy called NGC 7320 is not a member of the group.


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## xenocide (Nov 27, 2013)

1Kurgan1 said:


> That would be the explosion itself happening much earlier. I think he just meant those images we are capturing now are 6500 years ago, which would be correct. The date of the explosion would be 6500 years before 1054 AD.


 
That would be 5446 B.C.


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## 15th Warlock (Nov 27, 2013)

Drone said:


> A supernova that was witnessed by astronomer Tycho Brahe in 1572.
> The explosion spewed elements like silicon and iron into space at speeds of more than 5000 km/s. When that ejecta rammed into surrounding interstellar gas, it created a shock wave -- the equivalent of a cosmic "sonic boom". This reverse shock wave racing inward at 1000 times the speed of sound is heating the remnant and causing it to emit X-ray light.
> 
> 
> ...



I just discovered this gem of a thread by chance, I'm mesmerized by all the pictures you have posted, the one above is my favorite so far, please keep them coming! 

Thank you!


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## Drone (Nov 27, 2013)

No problem Warlock, glad you like the pictures. Here's more new space images:






*Dragon's Head Nebula* is ~ 160000 ly from Earth. This photo released *today*. Bigger version here: NGC 2035






*Cat's Eye Nebula *(NGC 6543)  is ~ 3000 ly from Earth, was formed about a thousand years ago.


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## Drone (Nov 28, 2013)

A spiral galaxy known as *Topsy Turvy Galaxy* (NGC 1313) located ~ 13 million ly way. 

The magenta spots in this image show *two ultraluminous X-ray black holes* . The black hole closer to the center of the galaxy is about 70 to 100 times that of our sun. The other black hole is probably smaller, about 30 solar masses.


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## Drone (Nov 29, 2013)

*Irregular* galaxy ESO 149-3, located ~ 20 million ly away from us.


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## Loosenut (Nov 29, 2013)




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## Drone (Dec 9, 2013)

This X-ray nebula appears to look like a human hand. The ghostly shape comes courtesy of a pulsar star called PSR B1509-58 that is just 12 miles in diameter. The nebula itself is 150 ly across. This pulsar is spinning completely around almost 7 times every second and is releasing energy into its environment at a prodigious rate - presumably because it has an intense magnetic field at its surface, estimated to be 15 trillion times stronger than the Earth's magnetic field. Energy leaves mostly via neutrino emission.


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## Ahhzz (Dec 9, 2013)

...missed the football....bad receiver.....


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## Drone (Dec 10, 2013)

M82, which is located ~12 million ly away in the constellation Ursa Major, is a classic example of a starburst galaxy - one that is producing new stars tens- to hundreds-of-times faster than Milky Way.







_The _*yellow*_ areas correspond to regions of intense star formation. The _*red*_ areas trace giant outflows of ionized gas fleeing the disk of the galaxy._


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## Drone (Dec 11, 2013)

Image of *NGC 6872* (left) and companion galaxy *IC 4970* (right) locked in a tango as the two galaxies gravitationally interact. The galaxies lie ~ 200 million ly away in the direction of the constellation Pavo.






About half of the *Whirlpool Galaxy*'s (*M51*) hydrogen molecules (blue) fill the spiral in a foglike layer, not in giant, individual clouds where stars form. The pressure the molecular hydrogen fog exerts on the giant clouds plays a larger role in making new stars than previously thought. The galaxy sits ~23 million ly from Earth in the constellation Canes Venatici.






_The Bird (ESO 593-IG 008 or IRAS 19115-2124) is a triple merger of galaxies (at a distance of 650 million ly), composed of one barred spiral, one more irregular and a third (the head) irregular galaxy that seems to be forming stars at a frantic rate (200 solar masses per year)._



> Because of the resemblance of the system to a bird, the object was dubbed as such, with the 'head' being the third component, and the 'heart' and 'body' making the two major galaxy nuclei in-between of tidal tails, the 'wings'. The latter extend >100000 ly (the size of Milky Way).
> The 'head' and major parts of the 'Bird' are moving apart at >400 km/s (1.4 million km/h!). Observing such high velocities is very rare in merging galaxies. Also, the 'head' appears to be the major source of infrared luminosity in the system, though it is the smallest of the three galaxies.
> The 'Bird' belongs to the prestigious family of luminous infrared galaxies, with an infrared luminosity nearly one thousand billion times that of the Sun. This family of galaxies has long been thought to signpost important events in galaxy evolution, such as mergers of galaxies, which in turn trigger bursts of star formation, and may eventually lead to the formation of a single elliptical galaxy.










> _What appears as a bird's head, leaning over to snatch up a tasty meal_, is a striking example of a galaxy collision in *NGC 6745*. A large spiral galaxy, with its nucleus still intact, peers at the smaller passing galaxy (nearly out of the field of view at lower right). These galaxies did not merely interact gravitationally as they passed one another, they actually collided.
> 
> _When galaxies collide, the stars that normally comprise the major portion of the luminous mass of each of the two galaxies will almost never collide with each other, but will pass rather freely between each other with little damage. This occurs because the physical size of individual stars is tiny compared to their typical separations, making the chance of physical encounter relatively small._
> 
> _However, the situation is quite different for the interstellar media in the above two galaxies. Wherever the interstellar clouds of the two galaxies collide, they do not freely move past each other without interruption but, rather, suffer a damaging collision. High relative velocities cause ram pressures at the surface of contact between the interacting interstellar clouds. This pressure, in turn, produces material densities sufficiently extreme as to trigger star formation through gravitational collapse. The hot blue stars in this image are evidence of this star formation._


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## Drone (Dec 17, 2013)

The bipolar planetary nebula Sh2-71 lies in the constellation of Aquila at a distance of 1 kpc






Tarantula Nebula (30 Doradus or NGC 2070) is located in the southern constellation Dorado 160000 ly from Earth.


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## Drone (Jan 10, 2014)

New cool high resolution images:






This ethereal object, known as *[SBW2007] 1*, is a nebula with a giant star at its centre. The star was originally 20 times more massive than our Sun, and is now encased in a swirling ring of purple gas, the remains of the distant era when it cast off its outer layers via violent pulsations and winds.






The nearby spiral galaxy *M83*, also known as the * Southern Pinwheel*, lies _15 million ly_ away in the constellation Hydra.
This Hubble photograph captures thousands of star clusters, hundreds of thousands of individual stars, and "ghosts" of dead stars called supernova remnants. The galactic panorama unveils a tapestry of the drama of stellar birth and death spread across 50000 ly.


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## Drone (Jan 17, 2014)

*Coma Cluster* is ~ _350 million ly_ away from us and _contains over 1000 identified galaxies_, the majority of which are elliptical.
The bright, saucer-shaped objects surrounded by misty halos in this image are galaxies, each of them host to many millions of stars. The background of the image is full of distant galaxies, many of them with spiral shapes, that are located much further away and do not belong to the cluster.


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## Drone (Jan 22, 2014)

Formed about 100 million years ago, the *Pleiades* star cluster (M45 or Seven Sisters) comprises 800 stars. It is located 410 ly from Earth in the constellation Taurus.






At the left, spiral galaxy NGC 2276, in the constellation of Cepheus, shows an asymmetrical appearance. To its right, we see elliptical galaxy NGC 2300, together with NGC 2276 forming galaxy pair Arp 114.


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## Drone (Jan 27, 2014)

The Lagoon Nebula is a giant cloud of interstellar gas and dust located in the constellation Sagittarius, ~ 5700 ly away.






Spiral Galaxy *M65*


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## Drone (Feb 7, 2014)

*Centaurus A* is a galaxy located _~12 million ly_ from Earth. In this image, the lowest-energy X-rays are red, while the medium-energy X-rays are green, and the highest-energy ones are blue.



> *This new image shows the spectacular jet of outflowing material - seen pointing from the middle to the upper left - that is generated by the giant black hole at the galaxy's center.* This high-energy snapshot also highlights a dust lane that wraps around the waist of the galaxy. Astronomers think this feature is a remnant of a collision that Centaurus A experienced with a smaller galaxy millions of years ago.


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## BiggieShady (Feb 7, 2014)

Drone said:


> Centaurus A is a galaxy located ~12 million ly from Earth.



12 million light years away ... it's amusing when you think about it, that jet was generated by the giant black hole at that galaxy's center while our Earth was in Miocene, 12 million years ago, when these dudes were roaming north america:


Spoiler


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## Drone (Feb 19, 2014)

Brand new image of M7 star cluster.








> M7 (NGC 6475), is a brilliant cluster of about 100 stars located ~ 800 ly from Earth. At about 200 million years old, M7 is a typical middle-aged open cluster, spanning a region of space ~ 25 ly across. As they age, the brightest stars in the picture - a population of up to a tenth of the total stars in the cluster - will violently explode as supernovae. Looking further into the future, the remaining faint stars, which are much more numerous, will slowly drift apart until they become no longer recognisable as a cluster.


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## Drone (Mar 3, 2014)

*NGC 660* is a polar ring galaxy at a distance of ~ 43 million ly in the constellation of Pisces. Polar ring galaxies are named as such because a substantial proportion of the stellar population, gas and dust orbit the galaxy is placed in rings around the nucleus. These rings are thought to be created by interaction with a neighbouring galaxy.


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## Drone (Mar 6, 2014)

Orange supergiant star, Xi Cygni, beams through the red haze of the North American Nebula's "west coast".

The North America Nebula is an emission nebula 100 ly in diameter located in the constellation Cygnus ~ 1800 ly away.


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## Samo_Krose (Mar 6, 2014)

these are so beautiful image, i love space,

how do u calculate the distance in light year?


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## BiggieShady (Mar 6, 2014)

Samo_Krose said:


> these are so beautiful image, i love space,
> 
> how do u calculate the distance in light year?



the speed of light = 299,792,458 m / s
1 year is 31,557,600 seconds
distance that light travels in a year is 299,792,458 * 31,557,600 meters or 9,460,730,472,580,800 meters


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## Ahhzz (Mar 6, 2014)

I'm used to the "186,000 miles per sec" myself


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## Samo_Krose (Mar 6, 2014)

Ahhzz said:


> I'm used to the "186,000 miles per sec" myself



What you mean? How you calculated?


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## Ahhzz (Mar 6, 2014)

Samo_Krose said:


> What you mean? How you calculated?


No, how I remembered it from class  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_light


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## Drone (Apr 8, 2014)

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals a galaxy cluster, known as *MACS J0454.1-0300*. Each of the bright spots seen here is a galaxy, and each is home to many millions, or even billions, of stars.

MACS J0454.1-0300 is so massive it is the equivalent of about 180 trillion suns. For comparison, the sun is about 333000 times the mass of the Earth.


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## Drone (Oct 22, 2014)

This image of the elliptical galaxy NGC 1132. The blue/purple in the image is the X-ray glow from hot, diffuse gas. The giant foreground galaxy, numerous dwarf galaxies in its neighborhood, and many much more distant galaxies in the background are seen in visible light.








Chandra's Archives Come to Life


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## Drone (Oct 24, 2014)

Lenticular galaxy NGC 4526. Its dark lanes of dust and bright diffuse glow make the galaxy appear to hang like a halo in the emptiness of space.
This galaxy is known to have a colossal supermassive black hole at its center that has the mass of 450 million Suns.






Galaxy NGC 1291. Though the galaxy is quite old, ~ 12 billion years, it is marked by an unusual ring where newborn stars are igniting.
NGC 1291 is located ~ 33 million ly away in the constellation Eridanus. It is what's known as a barred galaxy, because its central region is dominated by a long bar of stars (the bar is within the blue circle and looks like the letter "S"). The stars that appear blue in the central, bulge region of the galaxy are older; most of the gas there was previously used up by earlier generations of stars. When galaxies are young and gas-rich, stellar bars drive gas toward the center, feeding star formation. 

Over time, as the fuel runs out, the central regions become quiescent and star-formation activity shifts to the outskirts of a galaxy. There, spiral density waves and resonances induced by the central bar help convert gas to stars. The outer ring, seen here in red, is one such resonance area, where gas has been trapped and ignited into star-forming frenzy.


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## Drone (Oct 27, 2014)

NGC 1068 is a nearby [located ~ 50 million ly from Earth] spiral galaxy containing a black hole at its center that is twice as massive as the Milky Way's. A million-mile-per-hour wind is being driven from NGC 1068's black hole. This wind is likely generated as surrounding gas is accelerated and heated as it swirls toward the black hole.


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## Toothless (Oct 27, 2014)

Subbing! I've always loved learning about the vast space of space.


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## Drone (Oct 29, 2014)

Perseus & Virgo galaxy clusters (X-ray images)






NGC 90 is the spiral galaxy with extended arms at the top center of the image. Lies ~ 250 million ly away in the constellation of Andromeda.


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## Drone (Oct 31, 2014)

A hungry starburst galaxy M61






Spectacular edge-on view of lenticular galaxy NGC 4762. It lies ~ 58 million ly away in the constellation of Virgo 






An immense collection of nearly *500 galaxies* nicknamed "Pandora's Cluster" (Abell 2744). It weighs _>4 trillion_ solar masses.


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## Drone (Nov 4, 2014)

Nebula called Gum 15






Stellar nursery in NGC 3603


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## Drone (Nov 5, 2014)

Stellar nursery IC 2944







A dusty red object at the heart of our Milky Way Galaxy called G2 is a pair of binary stars that merged together. The object lies ~ 26000 ly from us.


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## Drone (Nov 6, 2014)

Oyster Nebula (NGC 1501). It lies ~ 5000 ly away from us.






Iris Nebula (NGC 7023). Lies ~ 1400 ly from Earth and is ~ 6 ly across. NGC 7023 is a reflection nebula, which means it scatters light from a massive nearby star. Reflection nebulae are different from emission nebulae, which are clouds of gas that are hot enough to emit light themselves.


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## 64K (Nov 7, 2014)

Australia Telescope National Facility
Astronomers found that the pulsar XTE J1810-197 emits radio waves at an unusually high frequency, despite its powerful magnetic field.


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## HossHuge (Nov 8, 2014)

Not trying to be a downer on these pics or anything but remember, these pictures are taken in black and white and then the astronomers photoshop them.



> *Teams of specialists on the ground gussy them up for public consumption*. Here's how it works: Telescopes like the Spitzer and the Hubble take black-and-white pictures using different filters to capture particular wavelengths of light.



http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...9/09/how_do_space_pictures_get_so_pretty.html


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## Drone (Nov 10, 2014)

The best view of ESO 137-001 - a spiral galaxy 200 million ly away in the Southern Triangle.






The galaxy is being stripped of most of its gas. This is a result of the Norma Cluster (into which ESO 137-001 is falling at several million km/h) gas - heated to millions of degrees - pushing the cooler gas out of ESO 137-001.


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## Drone (Nov 14, 2014)

The stripped spiral galaxy NGC 4522 (located ~ 60 million ly away from us).







The galaxy is part of the Virgo galaxy cluster and its rapid motion within the cluster results in strong winds across the galaxy as the gas within is left behind. *Scientists estimate that the galaxy is moving at more than 10 million km/h*. Bright blue pockets of new star formation can be seen to the right and left of centre.


And here's dusty spiral galaxy NGC 4414


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## Aquinus (Nov 14, 2014)

Drone said:


> The stripped spiral galaxy NGC 4522 (located ~ 60 million ly away from us).
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Technically if it's 60 million LY away from us, wouldn't what we're observing actually be what occurred 60 million years ago at that point in space? So those "new star formations" were actually occurring millions of years ago and we're just seeing them now. So they're probably well into their life if they were to be observed from a planet in the same system as one of those stars. I just like pointing this out because it's not like light crosses the cosmos instantly.


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## Drone (Nov 14, 2014)

Aquinus said:


> Technically if it's 60 million LY away from us, wouldn't what we're observing actually be what occurred 60 million years ago at that point in space? So those "new star formations" were actually occurring millions of years ago and we're just seeing them now. So they're probably well into their life if they were to be observed from a planet in the same system as one of those stars. I just like pointing this out because it's not like light crosses the cosmos instantly.


That's right. According to theory of relativity no information can travel ftl. Astronomers call them "new" because we're seeing them now (our local "now"). Technically speaking whatever you do/see/hear (even in everyday life) is in the past, we can't perceive reality in realtime because of these limitations.


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## Drone (Nov 17, 2014)

The barred spiral galaxy NGC 1672, showing up clusters of hot young blue stars along its spiral arms, and clouds of hydrogen gas glowing in red.






NGC 986 (barred spiral galaxy) is found in the constellation of Fornax sitting around 56 million ly away. Its golden centre and barred swirling arms are clearly visible in this image. Young blue stars can be seen dotted amongst the galaxy’s arms and the core of the galaxy is also aglow with star formation.






Look at that S-like structure!


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## Drone (Nov 20, 2014)

New image of Andromeda






MSH 11-62 (located ~ 16000 ly from us) and G327.1-1.1 (located ~ 29000 from us) - are supernova remnants.







When a massive star runs out of fuel resulting in a supernova explosion, the central regions usually collapse to form a neutron star. The energy generated by the formation of the neutron star triggers a supernova. As the outward-moving shock wave sweeps up interstellar gas, a reverse shock wave is driven inward, heating the stellar ejecta. Meanwhile, the rapid rotation and intense magnetic field of the neutron star (pulsar), combine to generate a powerful wind of high-energy particles.


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## Drone (Nov 25, 2014)

The Egg Nebula, lies ~ 3000 ly from Earth.

Although the dying star is hidden behind the thick dust lane that streaks down the center of this image, it is revealed by the four lighthouse-like beams clearly visible through the veil of dust that lies beyond the central lane. The light beams were able to penetrate the central dust lane due to paths carved out of the thick cloud by powerful jets of material expelled from the dying star, although the cause of these jets is not yet known.


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## Drone (Nov 26, 2014)

A small galaxy, called Sextans A, located 4.5 million ly from Earth. The environment in this galaxy is similar to that of our infant universe because it lacks elements heavier than hydrogen and helium. Heavy metals act in some ways like fertilizers for stars, helping them form and grow. Scientists study galaxies like Sextans A to learn how stars still manage to slowly bloom under these poor-growing conditions. The research provides a better understanding of how the very first stars in our universe came to be. In this image, the purple shows gas; blue shows young stars and the orange and yellow dots are newly formed stars heating up dust.






NGC 3532 is a bright open cluster located ~1300 ly away in the constellation of Carina. NGC 3532 covers an area of the sky that is almost twice the size of the full Moon. This grouping of stars is ~ 300 million years old. This makes it middle-aged by open star cluster standards. The cluster stars that started off with moderate masses are still shining brightly with blue-white colours, but the more massive ones have already exhausted their supplies of hydrogen fuel and have become red giant stars. As a result the cluster appears rich in both blue and orange stars. The most massive stars in the original cluster will have already run through their brief but brilliant lives and exploded as supernovae long ago. There are also numerous less conspicuous fainter stars of lower mass that have longer lives and shine with yellow or red hues. NGC 3532 consists of around 400 stars in total.


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## Drone (Nov 26, 2014)

The supermassive black hole at the core of the spiral galaxy NGC 4151. NGC 4151 is located ~ 62 million ly away from us.






A slightly warped dwarf galaxy known as UGC 1281. This galaxy lies roughly 18 million ly away in the constellation of Triangulum. It has a slightly warped shape to its outer edges, and is forming stars at a particularly low rate. The bright companion to the lower left of UGC 1281 is the small galaxy PGC 6700, officially known as 2MASX J01493473+3234464.


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## Drone (Nov 28, 2014)

These amazing images are of the planet Mars passing below Lagoon and Trifid nebulae.

Located ~ 5000 ly from Earth, the Lagoon Nebula (M8 or NGC 6523) is one of two star-forming regions visible to the unaided eye from the Northern Hemisphere. It's ~ 110 ly across and.

The Trifid Nebula (M20 or NGC 6514) is a combination of an emission nebula (the red area), a reflection nebula (the blue area) and a dark nebula. Also visible are the star-forming regions of NGC 6559, IC 1274 and IC 1275.






A false-color X-ray image of the core of the *Virgo* cluster of galaxies. The emission comes from very hot gas between the galaxies. This gas should cool off, but doesn't. The scale mark corresponds to a physical scale of 50 ly.


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## Peter1986C (Nov 28, 2014)

I did not know of this thread lol. subbed.


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## Drone (Dec 1, 2014)

Two galaxies masquerading as one​
The closer galaxy is located 100 million ly away. It is spiral in shape, but from our viewpoint on Earth, we are seeing its thin edge. The bright glow of dense starfields that run along the galaxy's central plane, and in its core, are easily seen.
The farther galaxy, seen in magenta, is nearly 7 billion ly away. Two giant jets shoot away from this galaxy, one of which is seen above the plane of the closer galaxy's disk, while the other is hidden behind it. A second distant radio galaxy can be seen as a magenta dot further to the right.







This image shows a region that lies within the constellation of Scorpius, close to the central plane of the galaxy. The region hosts a dense cloud of dust and gas associated with the molecular cloud clearly visible as an orange smudge at the centre of the image.
Clouds like these are breeding grounds for new stars. In the centre of this cloud the bright object known as G345.4938+01.4677 can just be seen beyond the veil of gas and dust. *This is a very young star in the process of forming as the cloud collapses under gravity*. The young star is very bright and heavy (~15 times more massive than the Sun). _There is a large disc of gas and dust around the forming star as well as a stream of material flowing out from it_.
The bright star in the bottom left of the image is known as *HD 153220*.


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## Drone (Dec 2, 2014)

*Lord of the stars - Galaxy M87
*​M87 is a giant (120000-ly-diameter) elliptical galaxy with an estimated mass of 300 billion suns.

http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo9207a/

Located 52-54 million ly away at the heart of the neighboring Virgo cluster of galaxies, M87 is the nearest example of an active galactic nucleus with a bright optical jet. The jet appears as a string of knots within a widening cone extending out from the core of M87. According to one theory, the jet is most likely powered by a 2-3 billion solar mass black hole at the nucleus of M87. Magnetic fields generated within a spinning accretion disk surrounding the black hole, spiral around the edge of the jet. The fields confine the jet to a long narrow tube of hot plasma and charged particles. High speed electrons and protons which are accelerated near the black hole race along the tube at nearly the speed of light. When electrons are caught up in the magnetic field they radiate in a process called synchrotron radiation.






http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo0020a/






http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic0815j/






http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic0815f/


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## Drone (Dec 3, 2014)

Irregular dwarf galaxy NGC 2366 located ~ 10 million ly away in the constellation of Camelopardalis. The most obvious feature in this starry mist is a large nebula NGC 2363 visible in the upper-right part of the image. A new generation of stellar titans has lit up this nebula.






J1649+2635 (located ~ 800 million ly from Earth) is a spiral galaxy, like our own Milky Way, but with prominent "jets" of subatomic particles propelled outward from its core at nearly the speed of light.






Little spiral galaxy NGC 4102 lies in the northern constellation of Ursa Major. Its nucleus emits particular types of radiation - specifically, emission from weakly-ionized or neutral atoms of certain elements. There's a starburst region towards its center, where stars are being created at a rate much more furious than in a normal galaxy.


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## Drone (Dec 8, 2014)

NGC 3226 and NGC 3227 galaxies






M92 - metal-poor oldest (with an age almost the same as the age of the Universe) and brightest globular cluster in the Milky Way. It contains some 330 000 stars in total.


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## Drone (Dec 12, 2014)

*M101 (Pinwheel Galaxy)*

The Pinwheel Galaxy is in the constellation of Ursa Major . It is about 70% larger than our galaxy, with a diameter of ~ 170000 ly, and sits at a distance of 21 million ly from us.






Giant elliptical galaxy *NGC 1316* with complex loops and blobs of cosmic dust.






Galaxy cluster MACS J0416.1-2403 has 160 trillion times the mass of the Sun in an area over 650000 ly across.






NGC 2207 and IC 2163 are two spiral galaxies in the process of merging. They're located ~130 million ly from us, in the constellation of Canis Major. These galaxies are sprinkled with many star systems known as X-ray binaries, which consist of a star in a tight orbit around either a neutron star or a "stellar-mass" black hole. The strong gravity of the neutron star or black hole pulls matter from the companion star. As this matter falls toward the neutron star or black hole, it is heated to millions of degrees and generates X-rays.


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## Drone (Dec 17, 2014)

UGC 8335 (Arp 238) is a strongly interacting pair of spiral galaxies located in the constellation of Ursa Major, the Great Bear, ~ 400 million ly from Earth.






NGC 2371, is a planetary nebula, the glowing remains of a sun-like star. The remnant star visible at the center of NGC 2371 is the super-hot core of the former red giant, now stripped of its outer layers. NGC 2371 lies ~  4300 ly away in the constellation Gemini.
A planetary nebula is an expanding cloud of gas ejected from a star that is nearing the end of its life. The nebula glows because of ultraviolet radiation from the hot remnant star at its center. In only a few thousand years the nebula will dissipate into space. The central star will then gradually cool down, eventually becoming a white dwarf, the final stage of evolution for nearly all stars.






Galaxy UGC 10214 resides ~ 420 million ly away in the constellation Draco. Its distorted shape was caused by a small interloper, a very blue, compact, galaxy visible in the upper left corner. The tiny intruder is likely a hit and run galaxy that is now leaving the scene of the accident. Strong gravitational forces from the interaction created the long tail of stars and gas stretching out more than 280 000 ly.
Numerous young blue stars and star clusters, spawned by the galaxy collision, are seen in the spiral arms, as well as in the long 'tidal' tail of stars. Each of these clusters represents the formation of up to about a million stars. Their colour is blue because they contain very massive stars, which are 10 times hotter and 1 million times brighter than our Sun. Once formed, the star clusters become redder with age as the most massive and bluest stars exhaust their fuel and burn out. These clusters will eventually become old globular clusters similar to those found in essentially all halos of galaxies, including our own Milky Way.


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## Drone (Dec 17, 2014)

A new image of a well-known star cluster *M47* in the southern sky, shows off hot blue stars sparkling amid red giants. The blue stars are younger and hotter, while the red stars are cooler. The red stars have short lives and are further along in their lifespans than the blue stars, which aren't quite as massive.

The cluster is ~ 1600 ly from us and it's 78 million years old. It only has 50 stars visible from Earth in a small region, ~ 12 ly across.

Video


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## Drone (Dec 19, 2014)

NGC 1266 is a lenticular galaxy located in the constellation Eridanus, ~ *100 million ly away*. The turbulence detected in NGC 1266 is stirred up by jets from the galaxy’s central black hole slamming into an incredibly dense envelope of gas.






Amazing images of Compact Galaxy Groups.


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## Drone (Dec 20, 2014)

Warm two-lobed planetary nebula called the *Red Spider* nebula is located 3000 ly away in the constellation of Sagittarius. It harbors one of the hottest stars known and its powerful stellar winds generate waves 100 billion km high. The waves are caused by supersonic shocks, formed when the local gas is compressed and heated in front of the rapidly expanding lobes. The atoms caught in the shock emit the spectacular radiation seen in this image.










Video about Andromeda


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## Drone (Dec 23, 2014)

*Heart Nebula* (IC 1805) lies ~ 7500 ly away in the constellation Cassiopeia.






The Horsehead nebula is only one small feature in the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex, dominated in the center of this view by the brilliant Flame nebula (NGC 2024). The smaller, glowing cavity falling between the Flame and the Horsehead is called NGC 2023. These regions are ~ 1200 ly away.


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## Drone (Dec 31, 2014)

The Superwind Galaxy NGC 4666 is located ~ 80 million ly from Earth. Gravitational interactions between NGC 4666 and NGC 4668 (to the lower left) triggered intense star formation.






Galaxy *M74*.

Bright pink (HII) regions decorating the spiral arms are huge and relatively short-lived, clouds of hydrogen gas which glow due to the strong radiation from hot, young stars embedded within them.


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## Drone (Jan 1, 2015)

The galaxy, called NGC 1097, is located 50 million ly away. The "eye" at the center of the galaxy is actually a monstrous (~ 100 million times the mass of our sun) black hole surrounded by a ring of young stars. The fuzzy blue dot to the left, which appears to fit snuggly between the arms, is a companion galaxy.






A reflection nebula called NGC 1333 is located 1000 ly from us in the constellation Perseus. The young stars in NGC 1333 do not form a single cluster, but are split between two sub-groups. One group is to the north near the nebula shown as red in the image. The other group is south, where the features shown in yellow and green.






The "Cat's Eye" planetary nebula (NGC 6543). Such objects are the glowing remnants of dust and gas expelled from moderate-sized stars during their last stages of life. Our own sun will generate such a nebula in ~ 5 billion years.


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## Drone (Jan 5, 2015)

IC 335 is 45 000 ly-long lenticular galaxy located in the Fornax Galaxy Cluster 60 million ly away.






NGC 6535 is an ancient one ly-long globular cluster 22 000 ly away in the constellation of Serpens.


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## Drone (Jan 6, 2015)

Massive Tuesday goodness!!!!



New view of the *Pillars of Creation*















Soap Bubble Nebula (PN G75.5+1.7) is located in the constellation of Cygnus, not far from the Crescent Nebula (NGC 6888).











And finally, Hubble's sharpest and biggest image ever taken of Andromeda (M31). It shows *>100 million stars* and thousands of star clusters embedded in a section of the galaxy's pancake-shaped disc stretching across > 40000 ly.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 6, 2015)

Beautiful pics.

Are there any high res pictures of Comet Lovejoy out there ?

For those that dont know Lovejoy is a comet that is visible with the naked eye.

If you look towards Orion,s Belt    ( the 3 stars in a line)   there is a biggish star just below, the comet will follow an arc from left to right and is a green looking smudge.


Not sure if it is visible globally but if you are in the Uk it is defo visible.

If the sky is clear take a look. It wont take long to find it.


1. Look eastish
2. Find Orions belt.
3 See Comet

BINGO


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## revin (Jan 6, 2015)

Thank you @Drone  You really  Got some orcosmic Tuesday out of this world Awesomeness !!!
Just so awesome, new Hubble shots are mind blowing.  
We worked on a few parts for the Hubble, glad to see it's working so great !


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## Drone (Jan 6, 2015)

revin said:


> Thank you @Drone  You really  Got some orcosmic Tuesday out of this world Awesomeness !!!
> Just so awesome, new Hubble shots are mind blowing.
> We worked on a few parts for the Hubble, glad to see it's working so great !




You're welcome, friend XD You can download that new gigantic Hubble image of Andromeda here (*WARNING: it's a 4.3 GB psb file*) and here's a magnet link if you want to download it with torrent client

magnet:?xt=urn:btih:5BE3C93B5C5D9150AB819B14B90360182BD3E26C&tr=udp://tracker.publicbt.com:80&tr=udp://tracker.openbittorrent.com:80&tr=udp://tracker.istole.it:80&tr=http://denis.stalker.h3q.com:6969/announce&tr=udp://tracker.ccc.de:80


Zoomable version


New Chandra image of Sagittarius A*






More info and download largest version here


Gemini Legacy image of the galaxy group VV 166






More info and bigger version here






CAPSLOCKSTUCK said:


> Beautiful pics.Are there any high res pictures of Comet Lovejoy out there ?



See this gallery


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## Ahhzz (Jan 6, 2015)

Drone said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Man that Andromeda would make a killer background, but you'd never be able to find a damn thing on your desktop


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 6, 2015)

Hubble Chandra and Spitzer are 3 of my favourite words.

The new Hubble   Pillars of Creation pictures are amazing, the originals were good but...........  WOW


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## Drone (Jan 6, 2015)

So many astronomical news for today but I can't resist so I'm posting more news just before I go to sleep lol

National Optical Astronomy Observatory released amazing pic of *M33 spiral galaxy*






If you want to download *bigger* version here it is -> click (155 MB jpg)

And exciting discovery:



> The Magellanic Clouds are the two brightest nearby satellite galaxies to our own Milky Way galaxy. *From a new study it appears that not only are they much bigger than astronomers calculated, but also have non-uniform structure at their outer edge*, hinting at a rich and complex field of debris left over from their formation and interaction.



Who would have thought it?







And another one: Milky Way core drives wind at 2 million mph



> At a time when our earliest human ancestors had recently mastered walking upright, the heart of our Milky Way galaxy underwent a titanic eruption, driving gases and other material outward at 2 million miles per hour. Now, at least 2 million years later, astronomers are witnessing the aftermath of the explosion: billowing clouds of gas towering about 30000 ly above and below the plane of our galaxy.


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## Drone (Jan 7, 2015)

New image of comet *Lovejoy




*

New image of *NGC 6819*






Stellar nursery *RY Tau*. The wispy remains of the gas cloud formed the bright variable star at bottom/center. This system is approximately 450 ly away, and spans about 2/3 of a light year.






Dark nebula LDN 483 is located ~ 700 ly away in the constellation of Serpens. The cloud contains enough dusty material to completely block the visible light from background stars. The starless nature of LDN 483 and its ilk would suggest that they are sites where stars cannot take root and grow. But in fact the opposite is true: *dark nebulae offer the most fertile environments for eventual star formation*. Stars will emerge from the inky depths of LDN 483, the dark nebula will disperse and lose its opacity. The missing background stars that are currently hidden will then come into view - but only after the passage of millions of years, and they will be outshone by the bright young-born stars in the cloud.


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## Drone (Jan 10, 2015)

Nebula near the star cluster *NGC 2074 *in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The region is a firestorm of raw stellar creation, perhaps triggered by a nearby supernova explosion. It lies ~ 170000 ly away near the Tarantula nebula, one of the most active star-forming regions in our Local Group of galaxies. In this approximately 100-ly-wide fantasy-like landscape, dark towers of dust rise above a glowing wall of gases on the surface of the molecular cloud. The seahorse-shaped pillar is approximately 20 ly long.






Emission nebula *NGC 2359 (Thor's Helmet)* lies ~ 15000 ly away in the constellation of Canis Major. It stretches ~ 30 ly across. Its center contains a bright and massive Wolf-Rayet star that blows a giant bubble through the surrounding molecular cloud, producing the interestingly shaped nebula.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 10, 2015)

Is the NGC 2359 image above a Hubble image?


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## Drone (Jan 11, 2015)

CAPSLOCKSTUCK said:


> Is the NGC 2359 image above a Hubble image?




Nope, here's the source

http://skycenter.arizona.edu/

http://skycenter.arizona.edu/gallery/Nebulae/NGC2359


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## Drone (Jan 12, 2015)

*Comet Lovejoy *&* Orion Nebula* (image by astrophotographer Chris Bakley)






Lenticular galaxy NGC 6861 in the constellation of Telescopium






A billowing tower of cold gas and dust rising from the *Eagle Nebula*. The soaring tower is 9.5 ly (*90 trillion km*) high.


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## Drone (Jan 13, 2015)

Radio galaxy NGC 3116


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## Drone (Jan 16, 2015)

Comet Lovejoy w and w/o the Pleiades











Spiral galaxy NGC 891 is located approximately 30 million ly away from us  in the constellation of Andromeda. The galaxy, spanning some 100 000 ly reveals filaments of dust and gas escaping the plane of the galaxy into the halo over hundreds of light-years.


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## Nullifier (Jan 16, 2015)

This thread is awesome!


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 16, 2015)

If you havent heard of Thierry Legault you have been missing out.

Check out his amazing photographs

i especially like this one of the Space Shuttle catching up with ISS.... incredible stuff.


http://legault.perso.sfr.fr/iss_atlantis_2010_crop.jpg

search his name for more pics and be aware his work is subject to copyright


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 16, 2015)

I honestly thought they wouldnt release this footage but its brilliant that they have.


*Spacex     Not landing.*

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/dramatic-video-spacex-falcon-rocket-crash-landing/story?id=28276723

Nobody dies, theres nobody in it they are trying to reuse as much of the craft as possible rather than ditching it in the ocean


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## Arjai (Jan 17, 2015)

Not sure where else to post this. I figured the people reading this post would enjoy it the most.

So, enjoy!


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 18, 2015)

nice one/  I have been holding off from watching this......

i know we are all different with different interests but it will never cease to amaze me how ignorant
some people are. Then again they could probably teach me a thing or 2 about selling shit

i know this probably belongs on some IM site but if you have never watched *Brickleberry* PLEASE try this.

Its on TV in the States but unknown here in the UK

It belongs on this forum because it is out of this world. Better than Family Guy and all the others
There are 3 series of this and every episode is fucking brilliant.

*ENJOY *                   then tell your friends. Click on thanks if you liked it,     

If you didnt like it then i think youve got some growing up to do

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=brickleberry


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 18, 2015)

*Check out the Planetary Society

http://planetary.org/*



Look up OSIRIS -REX     Send your name on a round trip to the asteroid Bennu.  WAHEY

*Comet Lovejoy *Timelapse

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...th-night-s-sky-captured-time-lapse-video.html


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## Drone (Jan 18, 2015)

*Owl Nebula* is approximately 6000 year-old nebula and located ~ 2600 ly away [in the Ursa Major constellation], and has a diameter of ~ 3 ly across.






*Dragonfish Nebula* is home to some of the most luminous massive stars in our Milky Way galaxy. It is located ~ 30000 ly away in the Crux constellation.
The massive stars have blown a bubble in the gas and dust, carving out a shell of more than 100 ly across (seen in lower, central part of image). This shell forms the "toothy mouth" of the Dragonfish, and the two bright spots make it up its beady eyes. The bright spots along the shell, including the "eyes," are possible smaller regions of newly formed stars, triggered by the compression of the gas and dust by winds from the central, massive stars.


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## Drone (Jan 19, 2015)

Spiral galaxy NGC 4217, 60 million ly away. Maybe it's just me but it reminds me of NGC 891 few posts above LMAO


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 19, 2015)

Space Images from my window


The moon came up......




followed by the sun


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 19, 2015)

I stepped out of the door of our local supermarket  



  Kaboom


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 19, 2015)

At our local Weapons Testing Range.  See the Observation Tower?


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 19, 2015)

The pink clouds are the heaviest.


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## VulkanBros (Jan 19, 2015)

Sharpest ever view of the Andromeda Galaxy (69.536 x 22.230 pixels)

This is a cropped version of the full image and has 1.5 billion pixels. You would need more than 600 HD television screens to display the whole image.

http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic1502a/zoomable/


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 19, 2015)

*Maurizio Pignotti* takes some wonderful pics..

http://www.mauriziopignotti.com/
 His work is subject to copyright.


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## Drone (Jan 21, 2015)

Sh 2-132






Heart Nebula


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## Drone (Jan 22, 2015)

Chandra Celebrates The International Year of Light






Bigger versions here



Interesting links:

Why Is Our Galaxy Called The Milky Way?

Why Is Andromeda Coming Towards Us?

Black hole on a diet creates a 'changing look' quasar


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 22, 2015)

When i saw the image top right i had to learn more, here it is ....



When a massive star exploded in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy to the Milky Way, it left behind an expanding shell of debris called SNR 0519-69.0. Here, multimillion degree gas is seen in X-rays from Chandra (blue). The outer edge of the explosion (red) and stars in the field of view are seen in visible light from Hubble.


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## Peter1986C (Jan 23, 2015)

Drone said:


> Sh 2-132



That could be nicknamed the My Little Pony Nebula.


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## Drone (Jan 28, 2015)

SH2-71, SH2-72, SH2-73











Arp 230






CG4


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## Drone (Jan 29, 2015)

Nebula NGC 2282






Two galaxies [NGC 7714 & 7715 (Arp 284)] drifted too close together 100-200 million years ago, and began to drag at and disrupt one another's structure and shape. As a result, a ring and two long tails of stars have emerged from NGC 7714, creating a bridge between the two galaxies. This bridge acts as a pipeline, funneling material from NGC 7715 towards its larger companion and feeding bursts of star formation. Most of the star-forming activity is concentrated at the bright galactic center, although the whole galaxy is sparking new stars.






The barred spiral galaxy NGC 6217 lies up to 90 million ly away in the north circumpolar constellation Ursa Major.


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## Drone (Jan 30, 2015)

Yellowballs lol seriously






New and not so new goodness by LOFAR (*Low Frequency Array*) radio telescope:






The center of the galaxy M82 at very long radio wavelengths; the bright points are most likely supernova remnants [each remnant can be as little as a few ly across]; the image is ~ 3300 ly across. M82 or NGC 3034 [Cigar Galaxy], is an irregular galaxy located in the northern constellation Ursa Major, ~ 12 million ly away. The galaxy, which is approximately 40000 ly across, is *creating stars at 10 times the rate of normal galaxies*. The reason for this is the relatively recent encounter with its close neighbor M81. The latest encounter is thought to have occurred around a hundred million years ago, during which M82 was significantly disrupted.







Galaxy cluster Abell 2256  [located 800 million ly from us] - a cosmic collision on a huge scale






Cosmic particles & magnetic fields in M51






Giant radio galaxy triplet


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## Drone (Jan 30, 2015)

Space is my wife!


Lovejoy






SH2-91






SH2-284 star-forming cloud of dust and gas located in the constellation of Monoceros [13000 ly away from us]. Deep inside SH2-284 resides an open star cluster, called *Dolidze 25*, that is emitting vast amounts of radiation in all directions, along with stellar winds.


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## Drone (Jan 30, 2015)

NGC 7049






3D structure of Cassiopeia A






Look at the cavities ...


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## Sasqui (Jan 30, 2015)

I'm loving this thread!







> If you're a NASA researcher stationed in Alaska, you're probably pretty used to seeing the aurora borealis, the sky-watching spectacle better known as the northern lights.
> 
> So staffers at the Poker Flat Research Range in Fairbanks decided to do what any bored teenager would do: fire rockets at it! Four small, suborbital sounding rockets were launched from the facility to collect data on the auroras, which are caused by the interaction of solar wind from the sun and the Earth's atmosphere.



Source:  http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-rocket-northern-lights-aurora-alaska-photo-video-205518437.html


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## Drone (Jan 31, 2015)

Cone nebula






Spiral galaxy NGC 2841 lies 46 million ly away in the constellation of Ursa Major.






NGC 281 is a relatively nearby [located ~ 9200 ly from us] cloud of gas and dust that lies high above the plane of the Milky Way galaxy.


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## Drone (Feb 2, 2015)

Galaxy J0836 rapidly losing its gas; shutting down star formation. *salutes & sheds a manly tear*






NGC 7814 [Little Sombrero] is ~ 60 000 ly across and it has a bright central bulge and a bright halo of glowing gas extending outwards into space. The dusty spiral arms appear as dark streaks. They consist of dusty material that absorbs and blocks light from the galactic center behind it. Little Sombrero is about the same size as Sombrero Galaxy, but as it lies further away, it appears smaller in the sky. 







Sombrero (M104) is one of the most massive objects in the Virgo cluster, equivalent to *800 billion suns*. The galaxy is 50 000 ly across and is located 28 million ly from us.






That's a helluva big sombrero. Man, wish I could wear that lmao


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## Drone (Feb 2, 2015)

The two interacting galaxies M51 A & B as seen in the infrared by the Spitzer Space Telescope. Emission from warm dust appears in red, and stellar emission in blue.






NGC 3242 (Jupiter's Ghost) lies some 3000 ly away, and it is visible in the southern constellation of Hydra. The white dwarf star at the center is shaping the double-shell structure of the nebula. The blue glow filling the inner bubble represents X-ray emission from hot gas, heated up to > 2 million degrees by shocks in the fast stellar winds, gusting at ~ 2400 km/s against the ambient gas. The green glow marks cooler concentrations of gas seen in optical light through the emission of oxygen, revealing the edge of the inner shell in contrast to the more diffuse gas making up the outer shell. The two flame-shaped features, visible in red to the upper right and lower left of the inner bubble, are pockets of even cooler gas, seen also in optical light through the emission of nitrogen.






Eskimo Nebula [NGC 2392] emits hot X-ray gas (blue) shining at 2 million degrees. This nebula  is located ~ 4000 ly from us in the constellation of Gemini.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Feb 2, 2015)

Astrophotography  Evolution of an Image

The features made of dust and gas, as shown in processed images, are actually there – but the human eye is simply not sensitive to the wavelengths of light they emit.


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## Drone (Feb 3, 2015)

The anatomy of the Milky Way as seen in gamma light










> 90% of that radiation is explained through the two processes: *collisions of super-fast protons with nuclei in dense, cold gas clouds* and of *electrons with photons*



Orion Nebula Glows in Amateur Astronomer's Photo


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## Drone (Feb 4, 2015)

Unbelievable and awesome news!!! OMG I'm so excited lol I nearly jump for joy, seriously.

Astronomers found plumes in first known spiral galaxy M51a [Whirlpool Galaxy]. The linear northwest plume is nearly 120000 ly long.








And now ... something more exciting *swoons*

ESO's VISTA survey telescope took new infrared images of M20 (Trifid Nebula). Apparently close to the Trifid in the sky, but in reality ~ 7 times more distant, a newly discovered pair of variable stars has been found. These are Cepheid variables, a type of bright star that is unstable and slowly brightens and then fades with time. *They are the first such stars found that lie in the central plane of the Milky Way beyond its central bulge*.

Trifid lies ~ 5200 ly from us, the center of the Milky Way is ~ 27 000 ly away, in almost the same direction, and the newly discovered Cepheids are at a distance of ~ 37 000 ly; they brighten and fade over a period of 11 days.






This is amazing. It means we're seeing for the first time things that no one ever did before us XD These Cepheid variables are the first such stars found that lie in the central plane of the Milky Way beyond its central bulge. They're so beautiful! Fascinating!!


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## Drone (Feb 9, 2015)

Globular cluster *M9* glows through a screen of stars in a spiral arm of the Milky Way. A globular cluster consists of a dense group of stars gravitationally bound to a host galaxy. In the foreground, two giant clouds of molecules and dust obscure the distant starlight.






In the center of this image is the galaxy cluster SDSS J1038+4849. It seems to be smiling. It's all caused by an effect known as strong gravitational lensing.


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## Drone (Feb 10, 2015)

In the heart of Henize 2-428 lies a unique object consisting of two white dwarf stars, each with a mass a little less than that of the Sun. These stars are expected to slowly draw closer to each other and merge in around 700 million years. This event will create a dazzling supernova of Type Ia and destroy both stars.






In the heart of Henize 70 is a small group of extremely hot stars which have stellar winds blowing from their surfaces with velocities that approach 4000 km/s. These outward flowing streams of energetic particles eventually interact with an almost stationary interstellar medium, releasing much of their energy as a thin spherical shell of luminous material. The hollow structure accounts for the shape we see in the sky. This nebula is almost 400 ly across, about 100 times the distance from the Sun to the nearest star, and is in the  Large Magellanic Cloud, the closest galaxy to the Milky Way.






This image shows a visible-light view of the emission nebula, Henize 206, which lies within the Large Magellanic Cloud. Embedded within Henize 206 is a region of star formation which is hidden in this image by obscuring dust.






Henize 1357, the youngest known planetary nebula. This image shows a rare moment in the final stages of a star's life: a shell of gas cast off by a dying star which then begins to glow. Its shape resembles a stingray fish, the nebula is one-tenth the size of most planetary nebulae and is 18 000 ly away in the direction of the southern constellation the Altar.


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## Drone (Feb 13, 2015)

Young stars in *Large Magellanic Cloud*






Birth of quadruple star system in molecular cloud *Barnard 5*






Supernova remnant *G299.2-2.9* gives clues about the explosion that created it about 4500 years ago. It belongs to the class of supernova known as Type Ia.


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## Drone (Feb 14, 2015)

*Abell 7* is a very faint planetary nebula of ~ 8 ly across, located some 1800 ly away from us in the southern constellation of Lepus. It's estimated to be 20000 years old. Its central star is seen here as a fading white dwarf some 10 billion years old.






Double lobe radio galaxy *NGC 5972






NGC 5963, NGC 5965, NGC 5969, NGC 5971 in Draco

NGC 5963 (upper left corner) 
NGC 5965 (lower left corner)  
NGC 5969 (upper right corner)
NGC 5971 (right edge)*


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Feb 14, 2015)

fantastic pics again Dude, keep em coming.




.


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## Drone (Feb 15, 2015)

Measuring about 80 000 ly from end to end, peculiar barred spiral galaxy NGC 2146 is slightly smaller than the Milky Way. It lies ~ 70 million ly distant in the faint northern constellation of Camelopardalis.


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## Drone (Feb 15, 2015)

Updates:


NGC 2444 (above center) & NGC 2445 (below center) form Arp 143 in the constellation Lynx


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## Drone (Feb 16, 2015)

Sculptor, [NGC 253] a disk-shape galaxy currently undergoing intense starburst, is located ~ 11.5 million ly from us.
The red region is the lower density CO gas surrounding higher density star-forming regions in yellow.






Globular cluster Palomar 12 was ripped from its initial home, Sagittarius dwarf irregular galaxy [SagDIG] ~ 1.7 billion years ago via tidal interactions between its former home and our galaxy.  Palomar 12 currently lies on the outskirts of the Milky Way's halo and it appears to be ~ 30% younger than other Milky Way globulars. 






SagDIG is a satellite galaxy to ours, and closely orbits around us - even occasionally passing through the plane of our galaxy. In fact, it is being slowly torn apart and consumed by the Milky Way.


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## Drone (Feb 18, 2015)

Some far-infrared sexy space






A far-infrared image of the cold pre-stellar cloud *L1544* (lower left, with other clouds of gas and dust nearby). The cloud is ~ 450 ly from us.






*XDCPJ0044.0-2033* is a massive galaxy cluster with an *estimated mass of about 400 trillion times that of our Sun*. It lies at a redshift of almost 1.6, meaning that we see it as it was 9.6 billion years ago.






Located at a distance of ~ 1500 ly, the *IC 5146* complex belongs to the Gould Belt, a giant ring of stars and star-forming clouds in the vicinity of the Sun.


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## Drone (Sep 2, 2015)

Nebula NGC 6826 is 2200 ly away in the constellation Cygnus







Gigantic nebula Gum 56, illuminated by the hot bright young stars that were born within it. For millions of years stars have been created out of the gas in this nebula, material which is later returned to the stellar nursery when the aging stars either expel their material gently into space or eject it more dramatically as supernova explosions.

Gum 56 has a diameter of ~ 250 ly and is at a distance of ~ 6000 ly from Earth.


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## Drone (Sep 3, 2015)

NGC 3521, a flocculent spiral galaxy located ~ 35 million ly away in the constellation of Leo. Spanning ~ 50 000 ly, this spectacular object has a bright and compact nucleus, surrounded by richly detailed spiral structure. The most distinctive features of the bright galaxy NGC 3521 are its long fluffy spiral arms that are dotted with star-forming regions and interspersed with veins of dust.


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## Drone (Sep 4, 2015)

NGC 253 - starburst galaxy located some 8 million ly from Earth






Star clusters in Andromeda


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## Drone (Sep 7, 2015)

Twin Jet Nebula






Sunflower Galaxy






This galaxy is ~ 27 million ly away and belongs to the M51 Group


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Sep 7, 2015)

Drone said:


> Twin Jet Nebula
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Just watched a nice vid about twin nebulae

http://www.space.com/30373-hubble-snaps-twin-jet-nebulas-spectacular-light-show-video.html


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## Drone (Sep 7, 2015)

CAPSLOCKSTUCK said:


> Just watched a nice vid about twin nebulae
> 
> http://www.space.com/30373-hubble-snaps-twin-jet-nebulas-spectacular-light-show-video.html



Yeah, that's the one. But my favorite is Hourglass Nebula


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## Drone (Sep 7, 2015)

I had another spacegasm

High resolution image of M43 taken with the 6.5 meter Magellan telescope in Chile and the MMIRS, which sees into the near-infrared spectrum.






Some good old pics by 2MASS


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## Drone (Sep 8, 2015)

This is a stunning pair of interacting galaxies, the barred spiral galaxy NGC 7469, a luminous infrared source with a powerful starburst deeply embedded into its circumnuclear region, and its smaller companion IC 5283. This system is located ~ 200 million ly away from us in the constellation of Pegasus.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Sep 8, 2015)

The most distant galaxy in the universe is 13.2 billion light-years away and was formed just 600 million years after the Big Bang, it has been revealed.

A team of Caltech researchers that has spent years searching for the earliest objects in the universe has unveiled their latest find.

Researchers say a galaxy called EGS8p7 that is more than 13.2 billion years old, while the universe itself is about 13.8 billion years old.







Astronomers say the discovery provides them with a rare opportunity to see how galaxies began to take shape when the universe was still extremely young.

In an article published in Astrophysical Journal Letters, Adi Zitrin, a NASA Hubble Postdoctoral Scholar in Astronomy, and Richard Ellis--who recently retired after 15 years on the Caltech faculty and is now a professor of astrophysics at University College, London describe evidence for a galaxy called EGS8p7.
Earlier this year, EGS8p7 had been identified as a candidate for further investigation based on data gathered by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope. 
Using the multi-object spectrometer for infrared exploration (MOSFIRE) at the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii, the researchers performed a spectrographic analysis of the galaxy to determine its redshift. 
Redshift results from the Doppler effect, the same phenomenon that causes the siren on a fire truck to drop in pitch as the truck passes. 
With celestial objects, however, it is light that is being 'stretched' rather than sound; instead of an audible drop in tone, there is a shift from the actual color to redder wavelengths.
Redshift is traditionally used to measure distance to galaxies, but is difficult to determine when looking at the universe's most distant -and thus earliest -objects. 
Immediately after the Big Bang, the universe was a soup of charged particles--electrons and protons--and light (photons). 

Because these photons were scattered by free electrons, the early universe could not transmit light. 

By 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe had cooled enough for free electrons and protons to combine into neutral hydrogen atoms that filled the universe, allowing light to travel through the cosmos. 

Then, when the universe was just a half-billion to a billion years old, the first galaxies turned on and reionized the neutral gas. 

The universe remains ionized today.

Prior to reionization, however, clouds of neutral hydrogen atoms would have absorbed certain radiation emitted by young, newly forming galaxies, including the so-called Lyman-alpha line, the spectral signature of hot hydrogen gas that has been heated by ultraviolet emission from new stars, and a commonly used indicator of star formation.

Because of this absorption, it should not, in theory, have been possible to observe a Lyman-alpha line from EGS8p7.

'If you look at the galaxies in the early universe, there is a lot of neutral hydrogen that is not transparent to this emission,' says Zitrin. 

'We expect that most of the radiation from this galaxy would be absorbed by the hydrogen in the intervening space. 'Yet still we see Lyman-alpha from this galaxy.'

They detected it using the MOSFIRE spectrometer, which captures the chemical signatures of everything from stars to the distant galaxies at near-infrared wavelengths (0.97-2.45 microns, or millionths of a meter).

'The surprising aspect about the present discovery is that we have detected this Lyman-alpha line in an apparently faint galaxy at a redshift of 8.68, corresponding to a time when the universe should be full of absorbing hydrogen clouds,' Ellis says. 

Prior to their discovery, the farthest detected galaxy had a redshift of 7.73.

One possible reason the object may be visible despite the hydrogen-absorbing clouds, the researchers say, is that hydrogen reionization did not occur in a uniform manner. 

'Evidence from several observations indicate that the reionization process probably is patchy,' Zitrin says. 

'Some objects are so bright that they form a bubble of ionized hydrogen. But the process is not coherent in all directions.'

'The galaxy we have observed, EGS8p7, which is unusually luminous, may be powered by a population of unusually hot stars, and it may have special properties that enabled it to create a large bubble of ionized hydrogen much earlier than is possible for more typical galaxies at these times,' says Sirio Belli, a Caltech graduate student who worked on the project.

'We are currently calculating more thoroughly the exact chances of finding this galaxy and seeing this emission from it, and to understand whether we need to revise the timeline of the reionization, which is one of the major key questions to answer in our understanding of the evolution of the universe,' Zitrin says.





Although the galaxy had previously been found by Nasa’s Hubble and Spitzer telescope, its distance has only now been confirmed. This was done using the W. M. Keck Obseratory’s 33ft (ten metres) telescope in Hawaii, pictured here with its shutter open


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## Drone (Sep 9, 2015)

NGC 7129 is a star-forming region and reflection nebula in the constellation of Cepheus. It is ~ 3000 ly away from us. The stars in this nebula are very young, only about a million years old.






The open cluster NGC 2437,8 (M46) is ~ 5000 ly distant, in the northern part of the constellation of Puppis.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Sep 10, 2015)

Astronaut captures incredible images of Earth, moon AND Venus from onboard the ISS





Posting the images to Twitter, astronaut Scott Kelly wrote: 'Day 166. #Venus photobombed the #Moon tonight. Good night from @space_station! #YearInSpace.' This image shows the curvature Earth, the moon and Venus behind it as well as part of the International Space Station in the foreground






The second image was posted this morning and said: 'Good morning Texas! Great view of you, the moon, and Venus this morning.' Texas is seen to the right of the ISS, the moon and Venus are pictured bottom left

Venus was particularly visible overnight because of its 'high albedo'. 

Albedo is the amount of light the planet reflects back into space and comes from the permanent cloud layer that surrounds it. 

These clouds reflect around 75 per cent of the sunlight they receive back toward Earth, and this reflected light explains why the planet appears so bright in Mr Kelly's images. 

The moon looks equally bright because of reflected sunlight, and also looks larger due to its proximity to the station. In reality, the moon has a radius that is three-and-a-half times smaller than Venus.

In fact, the moon is the only object in the night sky brighter than Venus.


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## Drone (Sep 13, 2015)

Barred spiral galaxy NGC 5643


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## Drone (Sep 14, 2015)

Another barred spiral galaxy *NGC 3893* (in the constellation of Ursa Major).






NGC 3921 in the constellation of Ursa Major - is an interacting pair of disc galaxies. You can see clearly in this image the disturbed morphology, tails and loops characteristic of a post-merger.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Sep 14, 2015)

ESO's Very Large Telescope has been used to create the first ever map of the weather on the surface of the nearest brown dwarf to Earth.






An internationalteam has made a chart of the dark and light features on WISE J104915.57-531906.1B, which is informally known as Luhman 16B and is one of two recently discovered brown dwarfs forming a pair only six light-years from the Sun. The figure shows the object at sixteen equally-spaced times as it rotates once on its axis.

*Brown Dwarf Binary CFBDSIR 1458+10*
*



*
This image of the brown dwarf binary CFBDSIR 1458+10 was obtained using the Laser Guide Star (LGS) Adaptive Optics system on the Keck II Telescope in Hawaii.This is the coolest pair of brown dwarfs found so far—the colder and dimmer of the two components is a candidate for the brown dwarf with the lowest temperature ever found


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## Drone (Sep 16, 2015)

NGC 6090 is a beautiful pair of spiral galaxies with an overlapping central region and two long tidal tails formed from material ripped out of the galaxies by gravitational interaction. The two visible cores are ~ 10000 ly apart, suggesting that the two galaxies are at an intermediate stage in the merging process. The Hubble image reveals bright knots of newborn stars in the region where the two galaxies overlap. NGC 6090 is located in the constellation of Draco, ~ 400 million ly away from us.







Sculptor Dwarf Elliptical is one of the 14 known satellite galaxies orbiting the Milky Way. This galaxy is located in the southern constellation of Sculptor and lies ~ 280000 ly away from us.


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## Drone (Sep 18, 2015)

NGC 6820 [Sh 2-86] is an emission nebula in a star forming region ~ 6000 ly away in the constellation of Vulpecula. It surrounds the relatively young open cluster of stars, NGC 6823. The most striking feature is the trunk-like pillar of dust and gas protruding from the east side of the nebula towards the open cluster, NGC 6823 in the west.


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## Drone (Sep 20, 2015)

*NGC 584* is an elliptical galaxy in the constellation Cetus. It's ~ 76.4 million ly away from us.


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## Drone (Sep 21, 2015)

Bubble Galaxy (NGC 3521) is a flocculent galaxy. In flocculent spirals, fluffy patches of stars and dust show up here and there throughout their discs.
30% of galaxies share NGC 3521's patchiness, while 10% have their star-forming regions wound into grand design spirals.


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## Drone (Sep 22, 2015)

At left is the galaxy J0702+5002, which isn't an X-shaped galaxy whose form is caused by a merger. At right is the galaxy J1043+3131, which is a "true" candidate for a merged system. Source






The galaxies at the top and bottom of the frame are named PGC 37639 and PGC 101374 respectively. A smaller and relatively intact spiral galaxy, known as SDSSCGB 19.4, can be seen to the right of the merging duo. This trio of galaxies comprises Arp 194, a galaxy group just under 600 million ly away from us in the constellation of Cepheus. The blue stream is thought to have formed through the turbulent gravitational interactions occurring at the top of the frame. The stream is some 100000 ly long, and made up of gas, dust and many millions of newborn stars. These stars, which are clumped together to form star clusters, which in turn later accumulate as superclusters, are responsible for the striking blue hue visible here. They are mostly young, hot and massive, a combination that causes them to emit blue light. Source


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## Drone (Sep 23, 2015)

NGC 7674 is a luminous infrared galaxy. It is located in the constellation of Pegasus, ~ 400 million ly away from us.
The central bar-shaped structure is made up of stars. The shape, including the long narrow streamers seen to the left of and below the galaxy can be accounted for by tidal interactions with its companions.


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## Drone (Sep 23, 2015)

Best image of Lobster Nebula ever taken






M17 is located ~ 5500 ly from us near the plane of the Milky Way. Its gas and dust clouds measure ~ 15 ly across. The gas in the nebula is estimated to have more than 30 000 times the mass of the Sun.

Download bigger version (*Warning*: file size is 158 MB)


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## Drone (Sep 24, 2015)

Rare image of NGC 1624






interesting video about SGR 0418+5729


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## Drone (Sep 25, 2015)

Small Magellanic Cloud






NGC 6960 [Witch's Broom Nebula] (2100 ly aways from us)






Download bigger version (Warning: 127 MB)


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## Drone (Sep 28, 2015)

Barred spiral galaxy NGC 613

It lies 67 million ly away in the constellation of Sculptor. A monstrous black hole resides at the heart of NGC 613. Its mass is estimated at about ten times that of the Milky Way's supermassive black hole and it is consuming stars, gas and dust.


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## Drone (Sep 30, 2015)

Gemini Observatory has released one of the most detailed images ever obtained of emerging gas jets streaming from a region of newborn stars called Herbig-Haro 24. Located in the Orion B cloud, at a distance of about 400 parsecs, or ~ 1300 ly from us, this region is rich in young stars.


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## Drone (Oct 1, 2015)

NGC 559 is a moderately large and compact open cluster in Cassiopeia. The stars are fairly bright and the cluster appears best with moderate magnification.






The galaxy cluster SPT-CLJ2344-4243, nicknamed the Phoenix Cluster.


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## Drone (Oct 6, 2015)

*Menzel 3* (Ant Nebula)

The Ant Nebula is located 3000-6000 ly from us in the southern constellation Norma.






*Menzel 2




*


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## Drone (Oct 6, 2015)

Guitar Nebula






Abell 2125


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## Drone (Oct 7, 2015)

Pulsar PSR B1257+12 (located 1000 ly from us)






Ultraviolet image of the globular cluster NGC 1851 in the southern constellation Columba.


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## Drone (Oct 7, 2015)

The old open cluster NGC 188






NGC 185 (Caldwell 18) is a dwarf spheroidal galaxy ~ 2.08 million ly away in the constellation Cassiopeia. It is a member of the Local group, and is a satellite galaxy of the Andromeda Galaxy.






Astronomers have discovered never-before-seen structures within a dusty disc surrounding a nearby star AU Microscopii (32 ly away). The fast-moving wave-like features in the disc of the star are unlike anything ever observed. The origin and nature of these features present a new mystery for astronomers to explore.


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## Drone (Oct 8, 2015)

Another "view" of 40-billion-mile-diameter edge-on disk encircling the young star AU Microscopii. The ripples are moving across the disk at a speed of 22000 mph.






White dwarf stars WD 0421+162 and WD 0431+126 in the Hyades star cluster, the nearest open cluster to us.


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## dont whant to set it"' (Oct 8, 2015)

Bonkers! ^how so precise at that 'humongos' distances?


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## Drone (Oct 9, 2015)

Repost of some X-ray images






γ -ray images of supernova remnants Kesteven 27 and 41


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## Drone (Oct 9, 2015)

Beta Andromedae (aka *Mirach*)






Alpha Andromedae (aka *Alpheratz *or *Sirrah*)


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## Drone (Oct 10, 2015)

A Hubble Space Telescope color image of a small portion of the M4 cluster only 0.63 ly across reveals 8 white dwarf stars among the cluster's much brighter population of yellow sun-like stars and cooler red dwarf stars.


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## Drone (Oct 11, 2015)

Polaris is actually a triple star






Sirius B


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## Drone (Oct 12, 2015)

NGC 4639 is a beautiful example of a type of galaxy known as a barred spiral. It lies > 70 million ly away in the constellation of Virgo and is one of about 1500 galaxies that make up the Virgo Cluster.


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## Drone (Oct 13, 2015)

HH 211 is located ~ 1000 ly away in the constellation of Perseus. Astronomers estimate that the small protostar hidden within HH 211 is <1000 years old-a mere baby by astronomical standards, so young that it is still growing by accumulating matter from a surrounding disk of gas and dust. The protostar eventually will become a low-mass star similar to the sun.






A pair of jets protrude outwards in near-perfect symmetry in this image of HH 212. The object lies in the constellation of Orion. The jet pulses vary quite regularly, and over a short timescale - maybe even as short as 30 years!


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## Drone (Oct 13, 2015)

The extended gas cloud near the planetary nebula NGC 3242






Composite image of an edge-on spiral galaxy with a radio halo produced by fast-moving particles in the galaxy's magnetic field. In this image, the large, grey-blue area is a single image formed by combining the radio halos of 30 different galaxies, as seen with the Very Large Array. At the center is a visible-light image of one of the galaxies, *NGC 5775*, made using the Hubble Space Telescope. This visible-light image shows only the inner part of the galaxy's star-forming region, outer portions of which extend horizontally into the area of the radio halo. This spectacular image shows that cosmic rays and magnetic fields not only permeate the galaxy disk itself, but extend far above and below the disk.


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## Drone (Oct 14, 2015)

Coalsack Nebula! Yay!






 Coalsack Nebula is 600 ly away in the constellation of Crux.

The little light that does make it through the nebula does not come out the other side unchanged. The light we see in this image looks redder than it ordinarily would. This is because the dust in dark nebulae absorbs and scatters blue light from stars more than red light, tinting the stars several shades more crimson than they would otherwise be.

Millions of years in the future the Coalsack's dark days will come to an end. As the stray material in the Coalsack coalesces under the mutual attraction of gravity, stars will eventually light up.

Download giant version *210 MB*


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## Drone (Oct 15, 2015)

Left: Map of the galaxy PACS-867 taken by ALMA where the emission from carbon monoxide (CO) shows the molecular gas reservoir out of which stars form. Centre: Image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope Advanced Camera for Surveys of PACS-867 that shows the rest-frame UV light from young stars in the individual components of highly disturbed galaxies as a result of a massive merger. The location of the molecular gas in Image 1 is overlaid (blue contours) that shows where new stars, enshrouded by dust, are forming. Right: Spitzer Space Telescope infrared image (3.6 micron) of PACS-867 highlights the stars embedded in dust and associated with the molecular gas. The UV light associated with the gas is faint while it is brighter in the infrared. This is due to the presence of dust that impacts the UV more than the IR.






Interacting galaxy Zw II 96 in the constellation of Delphinus, is an example of a galaxy merger located some 500 million ly away.






The green and red splotch in this image is the most active star-making galaxy in the very distant universe. Nicknamed "Baby Boom," the galaxy is churning out an average of up to 4000 stars per year, more than 10 times the number produced in our own Milky Way galaxy. It was spotted 12.3 billion ly away by a suite of telescopes, including NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

Baby Boom is a type of galaxy called a starburst. Like some other starbursts, it is thought to be a collection of colliding galaxies. As the galaxies smash together, gas becomes compressed, triggering the birth of stars. In this multi-wavelength portrait, the color red shows where loads of new stars are forming in Baby Boom, and where warm dust heated by the stars is giving off infrared light.

Green (visible-light wavelengths) denotes gas in the Baby Boom galaxy, while blue (also visible light) shows galaxies in the foreground that are not producing nearly as many stars. Yellow/orange (near-infrared light) indicates starlight from the outer portion of Baby Boom. The red blob to the left is another foreground galaxy that is not producing a lot of stars.






Cloud and Star Formation near the Filamentary Ministarburst* RCW 106*


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Oct 15, 2015)

Why we " aint seen nothing yet"

*The James Webb Telescope*




http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/





Hubbles primary mirror is the silver disc

1. It’s as big as a tennis court
With a sunshield 22 metres (72 feet) in length, the size of a tennis court, and a mirror 6.5 metres (21 feet) wide the JWST, which is due to launch in October 2018, is over twice the size of the Hubble Space Telescope, making it the largest space telescope ever launched.

2. The mirrors are coated in a golf ball’s worth of gold
The JWST’s mirrors are covered in gold to optimise them for infrared light, with the gold further protected by a thin layer of glass. The thickness of this gold coating is 0.00001 centimetres across the 25 square-metre mirror’s surface, and in total the gold weighs 48.25 grams, roughly equivalent to the weight of a golf ball.

3. It’ll be about four times further from Earth than the Moon
The JWST will take about a month to reach a position 1.5 million kilometres (930,000 miles) from Earth known as Lagrange point 2, or L2. Here the telescope’s observations will be unhindered by Earth and the Moon although, if it malfunctions (as happened with Hubble), we currently have no way to go and fix it.

4. It could see a penny 24 miles away
The angular resolution of the JWST, which is the sharpness of the images, is incredibly precise. It can see at a resolution of 0.1 arc-seconds, which means that it could resolve a penny 24 miles (40 kilometres) away or a football 340 miles (550 kilometres) away.

5. It could find water on exoplanets
One of the JWST’s most notable abilities is that it will be able to detect planets around nearby stars by measuring infrared radiation, and it will even be able to measure the atmospheres of exoplanets by studying the starlight that passes through. By doing this it will be able to determine if an exoplanet has liquid water on its surface.

6. It’s seven times more powerful than the Hubble Space Telescope
The giant mirror of the JWST is made of 18 individual hexagonal segments composed of lightweight beryllium. It is almost three times the size of Hubble’s mirror, boasting a light-collecting area seven times greater, but both mirrors weigh almost the same owing to the lighter materials used on the JWST’s mirror.

7. It’ll see the first light of the universe
One of the goals of the JWST is to observe the first stars and galaxies that formed just a few hundred million years after the Big Bang, an era of the universe that is not fully understood. The telescope will be sensitive to infrared light, which will enable it to do this.

8. It will unfold to its massive size in space
Many features of the JWST, including its giant mirrors and sunshield, are designed to be launched on a rocket in a smaller payload. The telescope will launch in a compact outfit and will unfold in its full configuration once it reaches space.

9. One side is hotter than Death Valley, the other is colder than Antarctica
The side of the JWST that will always face the Sun, the bottom of the sunshield, will reach temperatures of 85°C (185 °F). The other side, which houses the mirrors and science instruments, will operate at a much nippier -233°C (-388 °F).

10. It could keep working for a decade
The official mission lifespan for the JWST is between five and ten years. The telescope is limited by the amount of fuel it has on board used to maintain its position, which will be enough for a ten-year lifetime. Of course, other factors like budget cuts or malfunctions could end the mission earlier.

Launch is scheduled for launch in October 2018




Ariane 5 is the European launch vehicle chosen to fly from Kourou, French Guiana.

An Ariane 5 launch for you










https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope


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## Drone (Oct 15, 2015)

Radio and optical image showing the giant radio galaxy IC 711 and companions IC 708 and IC 712. All three systems are part of the distant galaxy cluster Abell 1314 and were serendipitously located in a field pointed at an unrelated low redshift galaxy.


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## Drone (Oct 16, 2015)

JHK image of the Milky Way's nuclear star cluster






Bipolar jet from a high-mass protostar IRAS20126+4104





This image shows IRAS 04302+2247, a star hidden from direct view and seen only by the nebula it illuminates. Dividing the nebula in two is a dense, edge-on disk of dust and gas which appears as the thick, dark band crossing the center of the image. The disk has a diameter of 80 billion miles (15 times the diameter of Neptune's orbit), and has a mass comparable to the Solar Nebula, which gave birth to our planetary system. Dark clouds and bright wisps above and below the disk suggest that it is still building up from infalling dust and gas.


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## Drone (Oct 16, 2015)

NGC 6339 barred spiral galaxy at the left. Above NGC 6339 the edge on galaxy PGC 60007 can be found. The giant elliptical galaxy at the right half of the image is NGC 6343.


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## Drone (Oct 19, 2015)

Galaxy M94 lies in the small northern constellation of the Hunting Dogs, ~ 16 million ly away. Within the bright ring around M94 new stars are forming at a high rate.

The cause of this peculiarly shaped star-forming region is likely a pressure wave going outwards from the galactic center, compressing the gas and dust in the outer region. The compression of material means the gas starts to collapse into denser clouds. Inside these dense clouds, gravity pulls the gas and dust together until temperature and pressure are high enough for stars to be born.







The open cluster M29


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## Drone (Oct 20, 2015)

Dwarf galaxy NGC 4214 may be small, but what it lacks in size it makes up for in content. It's packed with everything an astronomer could ask for, from hot, young star-forming regions to old clusters with red supergiants. Located ~ 10 million ly away in the constellation of Canes Venatici, the galaxy contains a large amount of gas, some of which can be seen glowing red in the image, providing abundant material for star formation. The area with the most hydrogen gas, and consequently, the youngest clusters of stars (~2 million years old), lies in the upper part of this image.






A nearby adolescent star named HD 100453 lies >350 ly away in the constellation of Centaurus, and is engulfed by a swirling disc of gas and dust.
Two faint spiral arms can be seen extending from the disc, possibly formed due to the influence of as-yet-unseen planets lurking within.


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## Drone (Oct 21, 2015)

This view shows part of the very active star-forming region around the Tarantula Nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small neighbor of the Milky Way. At the exact center lies the brilliant but isolated star VFTS 682. This brilliant solitary superstar is about 150 times the mass of the Sun.






This view shows part of the Tarantula Nebula. At the center lies the brilliant star VFTS 102. It's around 25 times the mass of the Sun and about one hundred thousand times brighter. *It's rotating at > 2 million km/h*  [> 300 times faster than the Sun] and very close to the point at which it would be torn apart due to centrifugal forces. VFTS 102 is the fastest rotating star known to date.






This image shows VFTS 352  - the hottest and most massive double star system to date where the two components are in contact and sharing ~ 30% of their material. The centers of the stars are separated by just 12 million km. In fact, the stars are so close that their surfaces overlap and a bridge has formed between them. It has a combined mass of ~ 57 times that of the Sun with surface temperatures > 40 000 C.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Oct 21, 2015)

Spitzer pics?


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## Drone (Oct 21, 2015)

Nope. VLT.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Oct 21, 2015)

Makes them even better then.....ta


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## dorsetknob (Oct 21, 2015)

*Starburst galaxy Messier 94*
 looks like a girly nights out Pavement pizza covered in glitter 
what were they drinking ???  Starbursts


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## Drone (Oct 21, 2015)

Yeah it's amazing to have a telescope array in a deadly desert. What we do to understand how the Universe works lol.

These spectacular panoramic views show parts of the Carina Nebula (left), the Eagle Nebula (center) and IC 2944 (right).






The pictures were created from images taken with the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Oct 21, 2015)

The best bit is......it just gets better and bigger.





Currently, the largest, ground-based telescope is the Gran Telescopio CANARIAS (GTC) found in La Palma on the Canary Islands. The aperture of this reflecting telescope reaches a total 10.4 metres (34 feet) in diameter and is currently one of the most advanced in the world. It can be used to explore remote planetary systems, galaxies, nebulas and black holes.






Although GTC is currently the largest, plans for even larger optical telescopes are currently underway. This includes the aptly named European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) planned for the early 2020s. The E-ELT will measure close to 40 metres (131 feet) in diameter and hopes to help us study our universe in more detail than ever before.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Extremely_Large_Telescope


I love this stuff


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## Drone (Oct 21, 2015)

dorsetknob said:


> *Starburst galaxy Messier 94*
> looks like a girly nights out Pavement pizza covered in glitter
> what were they drinking ???  Starbursts




Lol that glitter is young stars. NGC 1512 has them too. Even more sexy than M94.


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## Drone (Oct 22, 2015)

IC348/NGC1333 Region

Great swaths of dust disguise this direction in our galaxy. This great molecular cloud harbors the formation of new solar systems. However, fascination with the field lies not with what is seen, but instead by the intimated hints of activity. Subtle glows of pink and blue do little to cast warmth on a field that shows the structure of the cold interstellar medium.


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## Drone (Oct 23, 2015)

Friday goodness






Small section of the Milky Way mosaic shows the star system Eta Carinae






white dwarf star WD 1145+017 (blue object in the center)






The yellow blob at the center is PGC 43234, a small galaxy in which astronomers witnessed stellar debris being blown away after a supermassive black hole destroyed a star. With PGC 43234 located 290 million ly away from us, it was the closest tidal disruption event to be discovered in the past decade. Studying it with X-ray telescopes, the astronomers could measure, for the first time, the physical properties of a newly formed accretion disc around a black hole.


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## Drone (Oct 24, 2015)

_An elongated cloud of high-energy particles flowing behind the rapidly rotating pulsar, B1957+20 (white point-like source)._ The pulsar, a.k.a. the "Black Widow" pulsar, is moving through the galaxy at a speed of almost a million km/h. A bow shock wave due to this motion is visible to optical telescopes, shown in this image as the greenish crescent shape. The pressure behind the bow shock creates a second shock wave that sweeps the cloud of high-energy particles back from the pulsar to form the cocoon. Black Widow is 5000 ly away from us and is  billion year old. Black Widow is emitting intense high-energy radiation that appears to be destroying a companion star through evaporation. It is one of a class of extremely rapid rotating neutron stars called millisecond pulsars.






The pulsar, named PSR J0357+3205, is located ~ 1600 ly from us.  Its very long tail is > 4 ly across. The pulsar is ~ half a million years old, which makes it roughly middle-aged for this type of object.


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## Drone (Oct 25, 2015)

Panning Through the Milky Way












A pulse of light emanating from the protostellar object LRLL 54361. Most if not all of this light results from scattering off circumstellar dust in the protostellar envelope. An apparent edge-on disk, visible at the center of the object and three separate structures are interpreted as outflow cavities.

The extent and shape of the scattered light changes substantially over a 25.34-day period. This is caused by the propagation of the light pulse through the nebula. Astronomers propose that the flashes are due to material in a circumstellar disk suddenly being dumped onto the growing stars and unleashing a blast of radiation each time the stars get close to each other in their orbit.


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## Drone (Oct 26, 2015)

NGC 253 is the nearest spiral galaxy with a nuclear starburst. The central region is veiled by large amounts of dust. Considering that NGC 253 has a mass of more than 7 x 10^11 times the mass of our Sun, the IRC [infrared core] is an unexpectedly lightweight core, but which might be growing rapidly as it co-evolves with the violent star-formation process taking place in the galaxy's nuclear region.






The star system is named DI Cha, and while only two stars are apparent, it is actually a *quadruple system* containing two sets of binary stars.
As this is a relatively young star system it is surrounded by dust. The young stars are moulding the dust into a wispy wrap.


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## Drone (Oct 26, 2015)

Cygnus OB2 is a star cluster in the Milky Way that contains many hot, massive young stars. Deep observations of Cygnus OB2 have found many stars emitting X-rays.


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## Drone (Oct 27, 2015)

Visible light view of the central part of the Virgo Cluster. The brightest object is the giant elliptical galaxy M87 (left of center). The image spans approximately 1.2 degrees, or about 2.4 times the apparent diameter of a full moon.









_X-ray and optical images of M86 shows gas being swept out of the galaxy to form a long tail > 200000 ly in length._ Located in the Virgo galaxy cluster, this enormous elliptical galaxy is moving at ~ 3 million mph through diffuse hot gas that pervades the cluster. The supersonic motion of M86 produces pressure that is stripping gas from the galaxy and forming the spectacular tail.

M86 has been pulled into the Virgo galaxy cluster and accelerated to a high speed by the enormous combined gravity of dark matter, hot gas, and hundreds of galaxies that comprise the cluster. The infall of the galaxy into the cluster is an example of the process by which galaxy groups and galaxy clusters form over the course of billions of years.

The galaxy is no longer an "island universe" with an independent existence. It has been captured and its gas is being swept away to mix with the gas of the cluster, leaving an essentially gas-free galaxy orbiting the center of the cluster along with hundreds of other galaxies.

M86 is an unusual galaxy in that it is one of a small number of galaxies that are moving toward Earth, rather than receding with the general expansion of the Universe. This expansion is carrying the Virgo cluster away from us at a speed of ~ 2 million mph, but M86 is falling into the Virgo cluster from the far side of the cluster, giving it a net velocity of ~ one million mph toward Earth.


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## Drone (Oct 28, 2015)

X-ray image of the elliptical galaxy NGC 4636 shows spectacular symmetric arms of hot gas extending 25000 ly into a huge cloud of multimillion-degree-Celsius gas that envelopes the galaxy. At a temperature of 10 million degrees, the arms are 30% hotter than the surrounding gas cloud. A galaxy-sized shock wave is racing outward from the center of the galaxy at 700 km/s.






In NGC 4438, the larger galaxy in the lower part of the image, filaments of hot gas have been pulled to the right of the galaxy. The hot gas in the smaller galaxy, NGC 4435 (upper right), is concentrated around its central region. The two galaxies bumped into each other in the relatively recent past, ~ 100 million years ago.
During the encounter between NGC4438 & 4435, gravitational tidal forces tugged at the gas and stars on the outer parts of the galaxies. NGC 4438 was damaged in the collision, but the hot gas will probably fall back into the disk of the galaxy in a few hundred million years. NGC 4435, being less massive than NGC 4438, proved to be less crash worthy and appears to have lost most of its hot gas to intergalactic space.


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## Drone (Oct 28, 2015)

*96* open clusters hidden by the dust in the Milky Way






globular cluster VVV CL001








So many young gas-made hearts pumping in the Galaxy. What the fuck am I doing here? And I say ... *sigh* what can I say.


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## Drone (Oct 28, 2015)

I love Carina 








Carina Nebula is a star-forming region in the Sagittarius-Carina arm of the Milky Way that is 7500 ly from Earth and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory has detected *> 14000 stars in the region*.

Chandra's X-ray vision provides strong evidence that massive stars have self-destructed in this nearby star-forming region. Firstly, there is an observed deficit of bright X-ray sources in the area known as Trumpler 15, suggesting that some of the massive stars in this cluster were already destroyed in supernova explosions. Trumpler 15 is located in the northern part of the image and is one of ten star clusters in the Carina complex.

The detection of six possible neutron stars, the dense cores often left behind after stars explode in supernovae, provides additional evidence that supernova activity is increasing up in Carina. Previous observations had only detected one neutron star in Carina.


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## Drone (Oct 29, 2015)

Winnecke 4 is a double star in the constellation of Ursa Major






M12 aka NGC 6218 is a globular cluster in the constellation of Ophiuchus.






M14 aka NGC 6402 is a slightly elliptically shaped stellar swarm, ~ 100 ly across and ~ 30000 ly away.


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## Drone (Oct 30, 2015)

Peculiar galaxy NGC 660, located ~ 45 million ly away from us.

NGC 660 is classified as a "polar ring galaxy," meaning that it has a belt of gas and stars around its center that it ripped from a near neighbor during a clash about one billion years ago.

Its central bulge is strangely off-kilter and, perhaps more intriguingly, it is thought to harbor exceptionally large amounts of dark matter. In addition, in late 2012 astronomers observed a _massive outburst emanating from NGC 660 that was around ten times as bright as a supernova explosion. This burst was thought to be caused by a massive jet shooting out of the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy_.


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## Drone (Nov 1, 2015)

NGC 869/884 Double cluster (aka Caldwell 14)






NGC 869 and NGC 884 are ~ 7500 ly from us. They're approaching Earth at a speed of ~ 39 km/s. There are more than 300 blue-white super-giant stars in each of the clusters.


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## Drone (Nov 2, 2015)

This is a lenticular type S0 galaxy known as Mrk 820. A closer look at the appearance of Mrk 820 reveals hints of a spiral structure embedded in a circular halo of stars. Most of the smears and specks in this image are distant galaxies, but the prominent bright object at the bottom left is a foreground star called TYC 4386-787-1.


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## Drone (Nov 3, 2015)

Seen here is a comparison of the constellation Orion viewed in visible and infrared light. In the infrared image we can see clouds of dust and gas invisible to the human eye. The bright spots are the locations where stars are being born.






Witch Head nebula is estimated to be hundreds of ly away in the Orion constellation, just off the famous hunter's knee. The billowy clouds of the nebula, where baby stars are brewing, are being lit up by massive stars. Dust in the cloud is being hit with starlight, causing it to glow with infrared light.


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## dorsetknob (Nov 3, 2015)

*GIANT SUNSPOT HIDES SPACESHIP: *Sunspot AR2443 is so big, it is attracting the attention of astrophotographers around the world. Yesterday when Peter Rosén of Stockholm, Sweden, photographed the sprawling complex, he found a spaceship hiding among its dark cores. Seriously. Take a close look at the image below:





Source
http://www.spaceweather.com/


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## Drone (Nov 3, 2015)

I posted NGC 660 before (here and here) but this polar-ring galaxy is really beautiful so I add one more picture of it


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## Drone (Nov 6, 2015)

Hubble uncovered extremely faint and hot white dwarfs. This is a sample of 4 out of the 70 brightest white dwarfs spied by Hubble in the Milky Way's bulge. Astronomers picked them out based on their faintness, blue-white color, and motion relative to our sun.

The white dwarfs contain the history of a bygone era. They contain information about the stars that existed about 12 billion years ago that burned out to form the white dwarfs. As these dying embers of once-radiant stars cool, they serve as multi-billion-year-old time pieces that tell astronomers about the Milky Way's groundbreaking years.






An analysis of the Hubble data supports the idea that the *Milky Way's bulge formed first and that its stellar inhabitants were born very quickly - in < 2 billion years. The rest of the galaxy's sprawling disk of 2nd- and 3rd-generation stars grew more slowly in the suburbs, encircling the central bulge like a giant sombrero. *The Milky Way's bulge includes almost a quarter of the galaxy's stellar mass. Characterizing the properties of the bulge stars can then provide important information to understanding the formation of the entire Milky Way galaxy and that of similar, more distant galaxies.
*




*
Small section of Hubble's view of the dense collection of stars crammed together in the galactic bulge. The region is located 26000 ly away.


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## Drone (Nov 8, 2015)

I like Whales. I like Galaxies. Here's the Whale Galaxy






The Whale Galaxy [NGC 4631] is ~ 30 million ly away from us in the constellation of Canes Venatici and is a spiral galaxy much like the Milky Way. From our vantage point, however, we see the Whale Galaxy edge-on, seeing its glowing center through dusty spiral arms. The galaxy's central bulge and asymmetric tapering disc have suggested the shape of a whale or a herring to past observers. Many supernovae have gone off in the core of the Whale Galaxy.


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## Drone (Nov 9, 2015)

All stars form in dense clouds of dust and gas. As material condenses and a star begins to evolve, surrounding material forms a flattened, rotating disk that flows onto its surface. Because of the rotational energy of the material in the disk and with the help of the star's magnetic field, a portion of that material gets ejected from the star's poles, forming a *pair of jets* that can be seen with radio telescopes like ALMA.

In a recent survey of several protostars in the Serpens South star cluster, which is located ~ 1400 ly from us, astronomers were surprised to find one with brilliantly defined jets that seem to turn on-and-off with startling regularity, alternating from one to the other in possibly as little as 100 years. The protostar known as CARMA-7 and its jets are oriented in such a way that the upper jet is mostly moving away from us and the lower jet is mostly moving toward us. The twin jets are each nearly 2.46 trillion km long.






*MCG+01-02-015 is the loneliest of galaxies. The galaxy is so isolated that if our galaxy, the Milky Way, were to be situated in the same way, we would not have known of the existence of other galaxies until the 1960s.*


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## Drone (Nov 9, 2015)

*Jabbah* is the name of the bright star right of center, surrounded by a red colored dust cloud.
Though Jabbah appears to be a single star, it is actually a whole system of stars (possibly as many as seven), each of which is many times more massive, larger, hotter and more luminous than the sun. The Jabbah system is located ~ 440 ly away from us and lights up a giant cloud of dust and gas near it. The cloud near Jabbah is designated *IC 4592*, and the portion farthest away to the far left in the image is *IC 4601*.

The other bright stars in this image are mostly part of the "Upper Scorpius Association" and were probably once all born in the same cluster about 5 million years ago. These stars are all moving apart as the cluster ages, and are probably no longer bound to each other by gravity.

Another star of interest in the image is *9 Scorpii*, located in the lower right corner with the bright red dust cloud primarily on one side of it. It is moving through space at an enormous speed of 1000 km/s. With such a speed, the star may be a runaway star once in a system with a more massive member that exploded as a supernova and sent 9 Scorpii zooming through space. The red cloud near it may be a bow shock in front of it.


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## Drone (Nov 10, 2015)

NGC 6781 lies in the constellation of Aquila and is ~ 2 ly across. Within NGC 6781, *shells of gas blown off from the faint, but very hot, central star's surface expand out into space*. These shells shine under the harsh UV radiation from the progenitor star in intricate and beautiful patterns. The central star will steadily cool down and darken, eventually disappearing from view into cosmic oblivion.


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## Drone (Nov 11, 2015)

Less pretty images today but scientifically important and interesting:






_*RX J0806.3+1527* (or J0806)_ is a binary star system (lies just 1600 ly from Earth) where *two white dwarf stars are orbiting each other* approximately every 5 minutes. The pair appear to be separated by just 80 000 km - 5 times closer than the distance between the Earth and Moon. Energy loss by gravitational waves will cause the stars to move closer together. *Orbital period of this system is decreasing by 1.2 milliseconds every year*, which means that the stars are moving closer together at a rate of about *61 cm* per day.






The binary white dwarf system *SDSS J065133.338+284423.37* _(or J0651)_ located ~ 3000 ly from us*. The two white dwarf stars are so close together that they make a complete orbit in < 13 minutes, and they should be gradually slipping closer. The stars will eventually merge, in 2 million years.






An asteroid torn apart by the strong gravity of a white dwarf has formed a ring of dust particles and debris orbiting the Earth-sized burnt out stellar core **SDSS J122859.93+104032.9 *_(or J1228+1040)_*.* Gas produced by collisions among the debris within the ring is illuminated by UV rays from the star, causing it to emit a dark red glow which the researchers observed and turned into the image of the ring. The diameter of the gap inside of the debris ring is *700000 km*, approximately half the size of the Sun and the same space could fit both Saturn and its rings, which are only around 270000 km across. At the same time, the *white dwarf is seven times smaller than Saturn but weighs 2500 times more*.


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## Drone (Nov 12, 2015)

Korean astronomers discovered a faint quasar in the early Universe which sheds light on the main sources of illumination about 1 billion years after the Big Bang.
The newly discovered quasar, named as IMS J220417.92+011144.8, is expected to harbor a *black hole of about 10 million to 100 million solar masses*. Its distance is ~ *12.8 billion ly from us*. The discovery of IMS J2204+0111 and the statistical results of the survey suggest that *quasars can only contribute up to ~ 10% of the re-ionizing flux in the early Universe*. This value is lower than expected and doesn't provide enough energy to fully account for the re-ionization of the Universe. Therefore, it is unlikely that quasars are the dominant sources of illumination in the early Universe: 90% or more of the light must originate from other objects.






*************

Norwegian and US astronomers, using data from Gemini North and the Nordic Optical Telescope, have measured the time delay in images of a quasar SDSS J2222+2745 lensed by a foreground cluster of galaxies.

*A distant quasar has its light split into multiple images by a foreground galaxy cluster that acts as a gravitational lens*. The light travels along different paths of differing lengths to form each of these images.






The time delay between A and B is τAB=47.7±6.0 days; and between C and A is τCA=722±24 days.


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## Drone (Nov 13, 2015)

The westernmost star in Orion's belt is known officially as Delta Orionis. Delta Orionis is a small stellar group with three components and *five stars in total*: Delta Ori A, B, C. Both Delta Ori B and C are single stars and may give off small amounts of X-rays. Delta Ori A, on the other hand, has been detected as a strong X-ray source and is itself a *triple star system*.

In Delta Ori A, two closely separated stars orbit around each other every 5.7 days, while a third star orbits this pair with a period of over 400 years. The more massive, or primary, star in the closely-separated stellar pair weighs about 25 times the mass of the Sun, whereas the less massive, or secondary star, weighs about 10 times the mass of the Sun. The chance alignment of this pair of stars allows one star to pass in front of the other during every orbit from the vantage point of Earth. This special class of star system is known as an "*eclipsing binary*," and it gives astronomers a direct way to measure the mass and size of the stars.






************


Researchers using NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope have discovered the *first gamma-ray pulsar in a galaxy other than our own*. The object (*PSR J0540-6919*) sets a new record for the most luminous gamma-ray pulsar known.

The pulsar with an age of roughly 1700 years lies in the outskirts of the Tarantula Nebula in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small galaxy that orbits our Milky Way and is located 163000 ly away. *The Tarantula Nebula is the largest, most active and most complex star-formation region in our galactic neighborhood*. It's now clear that a *single pulsar, PSR J0540-6919 *_(or J0540)_*, is responsible for roughly half of the gamma-ray brightness we originally thought came from the nebula.*






The Tarantula Nebula was known to host two pulsars, _PSR J0540-6919 and PSR J0537-6910._* J0540 spins just under 20 times a second, while J0537 whirls at nearly 62 times a second - the fastest-known rotation period for a young pulsar*.

This campaign began as a search for a pulsar created by SN 1987A, the closest supernova seen since the invention of the telescope. That search failed, but it discovered J0537.
Prior to the launch of Fermi in 2008, only 7 gamma-ray pulsars were known. To date, the mission has found more than 160.


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## Drone (Nov 15, 2015)




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## Drone (Nov 16, 2015)

Amazing image of the elliptical galaxy NGC 3610. _*This elliptical galaxy contains a disc*_. The reason for the peculiar shape of NGC 3610 stems from its formation history. When galaxies form, they usually resemble our galaxy, the Milky Way, with flat discs and spiral arms where star formation rates are high and which are therefore very bright. An elliptical galaxy is a much more disordered object which results from the merging of two or more disc galaxies. During these violent mergers most of the internal structure of the original galaxies is destroyed. The fact that NGC 3610 still shows some structure in the form of a bright disc implies that it formed only a short time ago. The galaxy's age has been put at ~ 4 billion years.


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## Drone (Nov 17, 2015)

Star *T Leporis* to scale


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## Drone (Nov 18, 2015)

Owl Cluster lies in the constellation Cassiopeia at a distance of 8000 ly. The open cluster at an estimated age of 21 million years has long devoured the molecular cloud from which it was created.






Comet Lovejoy tries to "reach" Owl Cluster


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## Drone (Nov 19, 2015)

Not visible here is a Neptune-sized planet named *HAT-P-11b* which orbits the star. Astronomers have discovered clear skies and steamy water vapor on the planet. It is the smallest planet ever for which water vapor has been detected.

The small bright object next to the star is not the planet in question; in fact it is not a planet at all, but another star.


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## Drone (Nov 20, 2015)

A way of estimating more accurate distances to the thousands of so-called planetary nebulae dispersed across our Galaxy has been announced by a team of three astronomers based at the University of Hong Kong: Dr David Frew, Prof Quentin Parker and Dr Ivan Bojicic.

The solution presented by the astronomers is both simple and elegant. Their method requires only an *estimate of the dimming toward the object* (caused by intervening interstellar gas and dust), the *projected size of the object on the sky* (taken from the latest high resolution surveys) and a *measurement of how bright the object is* (as obtained from the best modern imaging).






A collage showing 22 individual planetary nebulae artistically arranged in approximate order of physical size. The scale bar represents 4 ly. Each nebula's size is calculated from the authors' new distance scale, which is applicable to all nebulae across all shapes, sizes and brightness. The very largest planetary nebula currently known is nearly 20 ly in diameter, and would cover the entire image at this scale.

*The largest, most evolved planetary nebulae are the most common type in the Galaxy*.


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## Drone (Nov 21, 2015)

*Sh2-221* nebula


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## Drone (Nov 21, 2015)

(Sh2-155) Cave Nebula






Sh2-157 nebula


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## Drone (Nov 22, 2015)

*Flying Bat Nebula*






Flying Bat Nebula (Sh2-129) is an extremely faint emission nebula in the constellation Cepheus. The nebula embedded within Sh2-129 is the Squid Nebula.


Other version, now focused on Squid Nebula:










dorsetknob said:


> Photo link blocked  shame



thanks, reuploaded


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## dorsetknob (Nov 22, 2015)

Drone said:


> Flying Bat Nebula (Sh2-129) is an extremely faint emission nebula in the constellation Cepheus. The nebula embedded within Sh2-129 is the Squid Nebula.


Photo link blocked  shame


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## Drone (Jan 30, 2016)

Reflection Nebula *NGC 2170* in the constellation of Monoceros. Ultraviolet light from nearby stars excites hydrogen and other gas atoms in the nebula, which then emit light of their own in specific colors.


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## Drone (Jan 30, 2016)

young open star cluster NGC 2169






Dreyer's Nebula (aka reflection nebula IC 2169)


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## Drone (Jan 31, 2016)

New image of the Elephant Trunk Nebula with the massive O-type star HD 206267 in the center. 
Radiation and winds from this hot star are thought to compress parts of the cloud and trigger star formation.


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## Drone (Jan 31, 2016)

*IC 1613*, aka DDO 8 and LEDA 3844, is an irregular dwarf galaxy located in the constellation of Cetus, ~ 2.41 million ly away.






What is this?
I can't sleep
Just radiate your love to me

A telescope reveals >100 stars in the *Hyades cluster*. The bright red star here is *Aldebaran*.


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## Drone (Feb 1, 2016)

This image, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, shows a peculiar galaxy known as NGC 1487, lying ~ 30 million ly away in the southern constellation of Eridanus.

Rather than viewing a celestial object, it is actually better to think of this as an event. Here, we are witnessing two or more galaxies in the act of merging together to form a single new galaxy. Each progenitor has lost almost all traces of its original appearance, as stars and gas have been thrown hither and thither by gravity in an elaborate cosmic whirl.

Unless one is very much bigger than the other, galaxies are always disrupted by the violence of the merging process. As a result, it is very difficult to determine precisely what the original galaxies looked like and, indeed, how many of them there were. In this case, it is possible that we are seeing the merger of several dwarf galaxies that were previously clumped together in a small group.

_Although older yellow and red stars can be seen in the outer regions of the new galaxy, its appearance is dominated by large areas of bright blue stars, illuminating the patches of gas that gave them life. This burst of star formation may well have been triggered by the merger._


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## Drone (Feb 1, 2016)

Emission nebula *IC 4628* [aka Prawn Nebula and Gum 56] lies ~ 6000 ly away in the constellation of Scorpius. These types of nebulae arise when a sun-like star at the end of its life spews forth an enormous amount of gas. The remaining star, a white dwarf, emits intense ultra-violet light that causes the gas to glow, with different elements of the gas displaying different colors. Red indicates ionized hydrogen, and near the central star, doubly ionized oxygen glows in green.










This stunning short sequence zooms in on the open young cluster of stars *Trumpler 14*


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## Drone (Feb 2, 2016)

Located ~ 1 billion ly away in the constellation of Eridanus, galaxy LO95 0313-192 has a spiral shape similar to that of the Milky Way. It has a large central bulge, and arms speckled with brightly glowing gas mottled by thick lanes of dark dust. Its companion, sitting in the right of the frame, is known rather unpoetically as [LOY2001] J031549.8-190623.

Jets, outbursts of superheated gas moving at close to the speed of light, have long been associated with the cores of giant elliptical galaxies, and galaxies in the process of merging. However, in an unexpected discovery, astronomers found LO95 0313-192, even though it is a spiral galaxy, to have intense radio jets spewing out from its center.


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## Drone (Feb 2, 2016)

A binary star pair within the Trapezium Cluster










Dwarf Galaxy IC 1613 (image is on the previous page)


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## Drone (Feb 2, 2016)

I once posted a picture of Flame Nebula. Here are some new and unseen pictures of Flame Nebula:






While Orion is known for its belt of three bright stars, the constellation is actually part of the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex which is much more involved, and beautiful, than meets the eye, as seen in the above image. This deep exposure shows many invisible details from the Flame Nebula glowing excitedly in the lower left and the dark Horsehead Nebula just to its right; to the star-birthing Orion Nebula in the upper right corner neighboring the Running Man with its blue stars.

Two other images of Flame Nebula taken by WISE:











Flame Nebula sits on the eastern hip of Orion.

This image shows a vast cloud of gas and dust where new stars are being born. Three familiar nebulae are visible in the central region: the Flame Nebula, the Horsehead Nebula and NGC 2023. The Flame Nebula is the brightest and largest in the image. It is lit by a star inside it that is 20 times the mass of the sun and would be as bright to our eyes as the other stars in Orion's belt if it weren't for all the surrounding dust, which makes it appear 4 billion times dimmer than it actually is.


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## 64K (Feb 3, 2016)

*Artist's impression of W2246-0526, a galaxy shining in infrared with the luminosity of 350 trillion suns.*

If anyone is curious to read about it

http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/02/alma-peers-inside-the-brightest-known-quasar/


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## Drone (Feb 3, 2016)

An old image of:






an intergalactic "pipeline" of material flowing between two battered galaxies that bumped into each other ~ *100 million years ago*.

The pipeline [the dark string of matter] begins in NGC 1410 [the galaxy at left], crosses over 20000 ly of intergalactic space, and wraps around NGC 1409 [the companion galaxy at right] like a ribbon around a package.

NGC 1409 is seemingly unaware that it is gobbling up a steady flow of material. A stream of matter funneling into the galaxy should have fueled a spate of star birth. But astronomers don't see it. They speculate that the gas flowing into NGC 1409 is too hot to gravitationally collapse and form stars.

Astronomers also believe that the pipeline itself may contribute to the star-forming draught. The pipeline, a pencil-thin, 500 ly-wide string of material, is moving a mere 0.02 solar masses of matter a year.

Astronomers estimate that NGC 1409 has consumed only ~ a million solar masses of gas and dust, which is not enough material to spawn some of the star-forming regions seen in our Milky Way.

The glancing blow between the galaxies was enough, however, to toss stars deep into space and ignite a rash of star birth in NGC 1410. The arms of NGC 1410, an active, gas-rich spiral galaxy classified as a Seyfert, are awash in blue, the signature color of star-forming regions. The bar of material bisecting the center of NGC 1409 also is a typical byproduct of galaxy collisions.

Astronomers expect more fireworks to come. The galaxies are doomed to continue their game of "bumper cars," hitting each other and moving apart several times until finally merging in another *200 million years*. The galaxies' centers are only 23000 ly apart, which is slightly less than Earth's distance from the center of the Milky Way. They are bound together by gravity, orbiting each other at 1 million km/h. The galaxies reside about 300 million ly from Earth in the constellation Taurus.


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## Drone (Feb 4, 2016)

Scientists measured the temperature of large dust grains around the young star 2MASS J16281370-2431391 in the Rho Ophiuchi star formation region, ~ 400 ly from us.

The astronomers used ALMA to observe the glow coming from carbon monoxide molecules in the 2MASS J16281370-2431391 protoplanetary disc.
They derived a disc dust grain temperature of only *-266 degrees Celsius (only 7 K)* at a distance of ~ 15 billion km (100 AU) from the central star. This is the first direct measurement of the temperature of large grains (with sizes of ~ 1 mm) in such objects.


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## Drone (Feb 5, 2016)

Astronomers succeeded in revealing the detailed structure of a massive ionized gas outflow streaming from the starburst galaxy NGC 6240 (located 350 million ly from us). The ionized gas the astronomers observed extends across 300000 ly and is carried out of the galaxy by a powerful superwind. That wind is driven by intense star-forming activity at the galactic center. _The star formation rate of NGC 6240 is 25-80 times that of our galaxy_.

NGC 6240 has a peculiar, disturbed morphology which indicates that two spiral galaxies are merging. Due to the giant starburst at its heart as a result of the merger, NGC 6240 is very bright in infrared light being emitted from heated dust. _The total infrared luminosity is almost a trillion times that of the Sun_.

NGC 6240 has experienced violent starbursts at least three times in the past and each starburst drove an energetic superwind. The oldest starburst started ~ 80 million years ago. Astronomers think that the galaxy merger process of NGC 6240 began ~ a billion years ago.


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## Drone (Feb 5, 2016)

NGC 6193 & 6231: Open Star Clusters

*NGC 6193* is a large open star cluster in the constellation of Ara. It's located ~ 3800 ly away from us and it's unusually rich in close binary stars.
Intense UV light streams from the hottest stars in the cluster *HD 150135 & HD 150136* - heating up and illuminating their gaseous surroundings, and thus making it shine brightly.

The other open star cluster in this image, *NGC 6231*, is located at the south-western bend of the Scorpion's tail. This young cluster, only ~ _6.5 million years old_, is approaching us at the speed of _100 000 km/h_. Its hottest star,* Zeta1 Scorpii, *is* one of the most massive stars in the Milky Way galaxy*.






Scientists discovered the* brightest ultra metal-poor star ever*, 2MASS J18082002–5104378


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## Drone (Feb 8, 2016)

Galaxy *NGC 3675*






This image highlights the hidden spiral arms (blue) that were discovered around the nearby galaxy *NGC 4625*.

The image is composed of UV and visible-light data, from the Galaxy Evolution Explorer and the California Institute of Technology's Digitized Sky Survey, respectively. Near-ultraviolet light is colored green; far-ultraviolet light is colored blue; and optical light is colored red.

As the image demonstrates, the lengthy spiral arms are nearly invisible when viewed in optical light while bright in ultraviolet. This is because they are bustling with hot, newborn stars that radiate primarily UV light.

The youthful arms are also very long, stretching out to a distance four times the size of the galaxy's core. They are part of the largest ultraviolet galactic disk discovered so far.

Located _31 million ly_ away in the constellation Canes Venatici, NGC 4625 is the closest galaxy ever seen with such a young halo of arms. It's slightly smaller than our Milky Way, both in size and mass. However, the fact that this galaxy's disk is forming stars very actively suggests that it might evolve into a more massive and mature galaxy resembling our own.

The armless companion galaxy seen below NGC 4625 is called *NGC 4618*. Astronomers don't know why it lacks arms but speculate that it may have triggered the development of arms in NGC 4625.


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## Drone (Feb 8, 2016)

The nearby spiral galaxy *NGC 4450*

The picture reveals nothing unusual in the galaxy center. Yet, astronomers have measured _wildly rotating gas in a disk around the center of the galaxy_. There the gas is moving 30 times faster than anywhere else in the galaxy. This gas rotation centered on the *supermassive black hole* is illustrated with colors. Red is receding gas and blue is approaching gas. These colors correspond to the physical effect of Doppler shift also known as redshift in astronomy.






Bipolar nebula Hen 2-437 is located within the faint northern constellation of Vulpecula. The material ejected by the dying star has streamed out into space to create the two spectacularly symmetrical icy blue lobes.


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## Drone (Feb 8, 2016)

The image shown here is a compact group of galaxies HCG 40 at a distance of 300 million ly in the constellation of Hydra. From top to bottom, the 5 galaxies in the group are a spiral, an elliptical, two more spirals, and a lenticular (S0). They clearly appear to be touching each other.

Interactions often occur in compact groups where galaxies are located so close to each other. Evidence of tidal interaction as a result of mutual gravitational attraction is actually seen in all 3 spiral galaxies in this group. The S0 galaxy at the bottom also shows evidence of interaction at its nucleus. Two blueish white dots in the image are stars in our own Galaxy. Small reddish objects are galaxies located billions of light years away. They appear redder than the members of HCG 40 because of the Doppler effect caused by the expansion of the Universe.










Zooming in on the star cluster NGC 3572


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## Drone (Feb 9, 2016)

Spiral Galaxy M98






An international team led by researchers from the Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille has observed NGC 4569, the *most massive spiral galaxy* in the Virgo cluster (at 45 million ly, the massive cluster of galaxies closest to the Milky Way). NGC 4569 is moving through the cluster at a staggering *1200 km/s*. The H-alpha image shows for the first time spectacular _tails of ionized gas that extend for > 300000 ly_, 5 times larger than NGC 4569 itself ! This observation confirms that *ram pressure stripping* due to the intracluster medium is depriving NGC 4569 of its gas reservoir. An estimate of the mass of gas in these tails shows that 95% of the interstellar medium has already been removed from the disk of the galaxy, greatly limiting its ability to form new stars.


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## Drone (Feb 10, 2016)

Barred spiral galaxy *Dwingeloo 1*. Probably one of the largest and nearest galaxies (10 million ly away), but undiscovered until 1994. This is because it's hidden behind the disk of our galaxy - as a result > 99% of its light is absorbed by dust in our galaxy before it reaches us.


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## Drone (Feb 10, 2016)

New image!







The glowing region in this new image is a reflection nebula known as IC 2631. IC 2631 is the brightest nebula in the Chamaeleon Complex. The complex lies ~ 500 ly away in the southern constellation of Chamaeleon.

IC 2631 is illuminated by the star *HD 97300*, one of the youngest - as well as most massive and brightest - stars in its neighborhood. This region is full of star-making material, which is made evident by the presence of dark nebulae noticeable above and below IC 2631 in this picture. Dark nebulae are so dense with gas and dust that they prevent the passage of background starlight.










Reflection nebula, like the one spawned by HD 97300, merely scatter starlight back out into space. Starlight that is more energetic, such as the ultraviolet radiation pouring forth from very hot new stars, can ionize nearby gas, making it emit light of its own. These emission nebulae indicate the presence of hotter and more powerful stars, which in their maturity can be observed across thousands of light-years. HD 97300 is not so powerful, and its moment in the spotlight is destined not to last.

Download original image (248 MB)


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## Drone (Feb 11, 2016)

*NGC 6530* is a cluster of _50-100_ stars which formed ~ 2 million years ago from the gas clouds of the _ Lagoon Nebula_, a part of which can be seen in the background. _ The hottest and most massive cluster member is ~ 40-50 times as massive as our sun, and is hundreds of thousands of times brighter_.






*NGC 6744* is a large face-on barred spiral galaxy in the star-rich southern constellation of Pavo.  It lies at a distance of ~ 30 million ly, and is almost 150 000 ly across. Its overall appearance, shape and size are very much like our own Milky Way galaxy. Like our galaxy, it contains > 100 billion stars. Stars like our own sun are far too insignificant to show up individually in this picture – they can only contribute to the general glow.

The bright nucleus of NGC 6744, as other spiral galaxies, is dominated by older reddish and yellowish stars, while the widely and thinly spreading spiral arms are home to bluer and younger stars. Hot star-forming regions, called HII regions for the ionized hydrogen gas they contain, are evident as fuzzy blue spots along the spiral arms. Dark lanes and patches show dust which is obscuring the light of the stars.


Both images by SALT (Southern African Large Telescope)


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## Drone (Feb 12, 2016)

The Seyfert Galaxy *M77 *(image by University of Arizona)






Located ~ _300 million ly away_ in the Coma Cluster, the giant elliptical galaxy *NGC 4889*, the brightest and largest galaxy in this image, is home to a record-breaking supermassive black hole. *21 billion times the mass of the Sun, this black hole has an event horizon with a diameter of ~ 130 billion km (~ 15 times the diameter of Neptune's orbit from the Sun). By comparison, the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy is believed to have a mass about 4 million times that of the Sun and an event horizon just 1/5 the orbit of Mercury*.










During its active period, astronomers would have classified NGC 4889 as a quasar and the disc around the supermassive black hole would have emitted up to *1000 times the energy output of the Milky Way*.


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## Drone (Feb 12, 2016)

_NGC 4874 is a giant elliptical galaxy, ~ 10 times larger than the Milky Way_, at the center of the Coma Galaxy Cluster. With its strong gravitational pull, it is able to hold onto > 30 000 globular clusters, more than any other galaxy that we know of, and even has a few dwarf galaxies in its grasp.

NGC 4874 is the brightest object, located to the right of the frame and seen as a bright star-like core surrounded by a hazy halo. A few of the other galaxies of the cluster are also visible, looking like flying saucers dancing around NGC 4874. _But the really remarkable feature of this image is the point-like objects around NGC 4874, revealed on a closer look: almost all of them are clusters of stars that belong to the galaxy_. Each of these globular star clusters contains many hundreds of thousands of stars.






*NGC 488* Galaxy


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## Drone (Feb 14, 2016)

Region *NGC 2264* (aka Sh2-273) includes the sparkling blue baubles of the *Christmas Tree star cluster and the Cone Nebula*.






NGC 2264 is an open cluster of stars embedded in a diffuse nebula. It is located in the constellation of Monoceros. The image also contains two famous nebulae. At the bottom center of the image is the *Cone Nebula*, and to the upper left is the *Fox Fur Nebula*. The bright star just above the center of the image is known as *S Mon*. The gentle arcs in orange and blue near the center of the image are Herbig Haro objects, jets of gas from protostars embedded in the nebula.


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## Drone (Feb 15, 2016)

UW astronomers find a rare supernova ‘impostor’ - SN 2010da - in a spiral galaxy *NGC 300* which lies > 6 million ly away.

SN 2010da is 20-25 times the mass of our sun and has a companion (a neutron star).





The supernova impostor SN 2010da circled in green and the X-ray emission indicated by a white cross.
There was just this massive amount of X-rays coming from SN 2010da, which you should not see coming from a supernova impostor. The X-rays are likely produced when material from the impostor star is transferred to the neutron star companion. The X-rays represent the neutron star “turning on” for the first time after its formation.


***************************







A young pre-main-sequence star HBC 1 surrounded by an envelope of dust. In this view, HBC 1 illuminates a wispy reflection nebula *IRAS 00044+6521*.


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## Drone (Feb 15, 2016)

Silver Dollar Galaxy: NGC 253




In this edge-on view from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer, the wisps of blue represent relatively dustless areas of the galaxy that are actively forming stars. Areas of the galaxy with a soft golden glow indicate regions where the far-ultraviolet is heavily obscured by dust particles.


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## Drone (Feb 16, 2016)

The giant spiral galaxy *NGC 253* (aka *Silver Dollar galaxy*) (shown in color) is accompanied by a newly discovered dwarf galaxy, NGC 253-dw2 (at upper left). The peculiar, elongated shape of the dwarf implies it is being torn apart by the gravity of the bigger galaxy – which in turn shows irregularities on its periphery that may be caused by the mutual interaction. They are located in the Southern constellation of Sculptor at a distance of 11 million ly from us, and are separated from each other by ~ 160 000 ly.

The dwarf has been trapped by its giant host and will not survive intact for much longer. The next time it plunges closer to its host, it could be shredded into oblivion. However, the host may suffer some damage too, if the dwarf is heavy enough. _This looks like a case of galactic stealth attack. The dwarf galaxy has dived in from the depths of space and barraged the giant, while remaining undetected by virtue of its extreme faintness.




_
Close-up view of the dwarf galaxy NGC 253-dw2. The closely packed red dots show that it is composed of individual stars.


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## Drone (Feb 19, 2016)

The open cluster *Trumpler 16*. This cluster is embedded within the Carina Nebula. At the top of the image, a peculiar nebula with the shape of a "defiant" finger points towards *WR25* and *Tr16-244*.


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## Drone (Feb 20, 2016)

Ground-based image of *Herbig-Haro objects in the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex* [a giant region of gas and dust undergoing active star formation]






Adam Block obtained this image of *V1025 Tauri*. V1025 Tauri is seen in the earliest stage of stellar evolution as it collapses to become a mature star. The nuclear fusion at the center of the star has begun, but does not yet have enough energy to blow away the dust clouds surrounding it.


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## Drone (Feb 22, 2016)

NGC 6543, nicknamed the Cat's Eye Nebula, is one of the most complex of the planetary class nebula, stars that throw of spheres of gas at the end of their lives. It is located in the constellation Draco and is thought to have been created 1000 years ago by two stars orbiting each other.






Sparkling at the center of this beautiful image is a *W*olf-*R*ayet star known as WR 31a, located ~ 30 000 ly away in the constellation of Carina.

The distinctive blue bubble is a Wolf-Rayet nebula - an interstellar cloud of dust, hydrogen, helium and other gases. Created when speedy stellar winds interact with the outer layers of hydrogen ejected by WR stars, these nebulae are frequently ring-shaped or spherical. The bubble - estimated to have formed around 20 000 years ago - is expanding at a rate of around 220 000 km/h.

Unfortunately, the lifecycle of a WR star is only a few hundred thousand years. Despite beginning life with a mass at least 20 times that of the Sun, WR stars typically lose half their mass in less than 100 000 years. And WR 31a is no exception to this case. It will, therefore, eventually end its life as a spectacular supernova, and the stellar material expelled from its explosion will later nourish a new generation of stars and planets.


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## Drone (Feb 23, 2016)

Another interesting image of Cat's Eye Nebula [NGC 6543]






The image from Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) shows a bull's eye pattern of eleven or even more concentric rings, or shells, around the Cat's Eye. _Each 'ring' is actually the edge of a spherical bubble seen projected onto the sky - that's why it appears bright along its outer edge._

Observations suggest the star ejected its mass in a series of pulses at _1500-year intervals_. These convulsions created dust shells, each of which contain as much mass as all of the planets in our solar system combined (still only 1% of the Sun's mass). These concentric shells make a layered, onion-skin structure around the dying star. The view from Hubble is like seeing an onion cut in half, where each skin layer is discernible.


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## Drone (Feb 23, 2016)

Scores of baby stars shrouded by dust are revealed in this infrared image of the star-forming region *NGC 2174*, as seen by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope. Some of the clouds in the region resemble the face of a monkey in visible-light images, hence the nebula's nickname: the "*Monkey Head*." However, in infrared images such as this, the monkey disappears. That's because different clouds are highlighted in infrared and visible-light images.

Found in the northern reaches of the constellation Orion, NGC 2174 is located ~ 6400 ly away. Columns of dust, slightly to the right of center in the image, are being carved out of the dust by radiation and stellar winds from the hottest young stars recently born in the area.

Spitzer’s infrared view provides us with a preview of the next clusters of stars that will be born in the coming millennia. The reddish spots of light scattered through the darker filaments are infant stars swaddled by blankets of warm dust. The warm dust glows brightly at infrared wavelengths. Eventually, these stars will pop out of their dusty envelopes and their light will carve away at the dust clouds surrounding them.

In this image, infrared wavelengths have been assigned visible colors we see with our eyes. Light with a wavelength of 3.5 microns is shown in blue, 8.0 microns is green, and 24 microns in red. The greens show the organic molecules in the dust clouds, illuminated by starlight. Reds are caused by the thermal radiation emitted from the very hottest areas of dust.

Areas around the edges that were not observed by Spitzer have been filled in using infrared observations from NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE.


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## Drone (Feb 24, 2016)

*RCW 120* is a region where an expanding bubble of ionized gas ~ 10 ly across is causing the surrounding material to collapse into dense clumps that are the birthplaces of new stars.






This magnificent poster of the starburst galaxy *M82* obtained with the XMM-Newton observatory was released in order to celebrate the International Year of Astronomy (in 2009), and as part of the 100 Hours of Astronomy cornerstone project.


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## Drone (Feb 26, 2016)

The blast of an enormous star created and powers supernova remnant *Puppis A* as it expands into the cosmic realm around it, 7000 ly from us. Oxygen atoms glow in a greenish blue and hydrogen and nitrogen give off a red flare. Earth would have received the light from the explosion close to 4000 years ago.






NGC 2174, aka Monkey Head Nebula


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## Drone (Feb 27, 2016)

Spiral galaxy *NGC 4424*, located in the constellation of Virgo. Along the central region of the galaxy, clouds of dust block the light from distant stars and create dark patches. To the left of NGC 4424 there are two bright objects in the frame. The brightest is another, smaller galaxy known as *LEDA 213994* and the object closer to NGC 4424 is an anonymous star in our Milky Way.






NGC 772 is a startling example of the dramatic alteration a galaxy suffers through a gravitational interaction with another one.
The spiral arms have been severely pulled apart while faint remnants of the most external spiral arm scatter in the intergalactic medium.


Yeah I remember, Aqua told me about this


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## Drone (Mar 1, 2016)

*Antlia* and *Phoenix* dwarf galaxies.











Antlia Dwarf Galaxy is > 4 million ly from Earth
Phoenix Dwarf Galaxy is 1.4 million ly away from Earth.

*Younger stars are found in the central regions and older ones are found in the outer areas*.


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## Drone (Mar 2, 2016)

New breathtaking image:






The vast nebula where massive stars were born, known as RCW 106, is captured here in fine detail. This sprawling cloud of gas and dust located ~ 12 000 ly away in the southern constellation of  Norma.

Many other interesting objects are also captured in this wide-field image. For example the filaments to the right of the image are the remnants of an ancient supernova (SNR G332.4-00.4, also known as RCW 103), and the glowing red filaments at the lower left surround an unusual and very hot star (RCW 104, surrounding the Wolf-Rayet star WR 75). Patches of dark obscuring dust are also visible across the entire cosmic landscape.

Download original image (*1.7 GB*)


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## Ahhzz (Mar 2, 2016)

Now that's a huge file......

edit: apparently, a little too noisy for a background tho lol


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## Drone (Mar 2, 2016)

Ahhzz said:


> edit: apparently, a little too noisy for a background tho lol



looks good anyway


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## Drone (Mar 5, 2016)

This wide-field image shows the patch of sky around the galaxy* NGC 1433*. This view was created from photographs forming part of the Digitized Sky Survey 2. The prominent red star to the left of the galaxy is *HD 23719*, which is just bright enough to be seen with the naked eye on a dark night.


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## Drone (Mar 6, 2016)

NGC 1433 is so cool. That's why I post some more of that galaxy:


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## Drone (Mar 7, 2016)

Image of *NGC 772* by Skycenter Arizona






This spectacular skyscape was captured during the study of the giant galaxy cluster *Abell 2744* [aka Pandora's Box]. While one of Hubble's cameras concentrated on Abell 2744, the other camera viewed this adjacent patch of sky near to the cluster.


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## Drone (Mar 7, 2016)

Invisibly buried in the center of this colorful swirl of gas is a dying star *Kohoutek 4-55*, roughly the same mass as the Sun. It's located 4600 ly from us, in the direction of the constellation Cygnus.

As a star ages, the nuclear reactions that keep it shining begin to falter. This uncertain energy generation causes the star to pulsate in an irregular way, casting off its outer layers into space. As the star sheds these outer gases, the super-hot core is revealed. It gives off huge quantities of UV light, and this radiation causes the gas shells to glow, creating the fragile beauty of the nebula. Red signifies nitrogen gas, green shows hydrogen and blue represents oxygen.






The image shows a small dim part of the supernova *SN 1006* remnant , which *was discovered on May, 1st 1006 - almost 1010 years ago*! WOWWW!


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## Drone (Mar 9, 2016)

Time to feel so small


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## Drone (Mar 11, 2016)

Fornax Cluster of galaxies, a complex of > 50 galaxies located ~ 60 million ly away.

Fornax cluster has an example of cataclysmic galaxy evolution in progress. Fornax appears to be a quiet place, even a bit dull, being dominated by old galaxies, ellipticals and S0's mostly. This appearance is deceiving, however; X-ray images reveal a more turbulent picture of a cluster in the late stages of a recent merger of a sizable subgroup with the main cluster. A closer look at the relative motions of the galaxies has revealed additional evidence for not one but two subunits of galaxies colliding with the main group.






Astronomers find clear evidence for an active history of galaxy-galaxy interactions, for example in bridges between galaxies, elongated groupings, and other unusual arrangements.


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## 64K (Mar 14, 2016)

Sometimes it boggles my mind just what is out there in the universe waiting to be found. This group of superclusters is one billion light years across and it's the biggest object found to date.






http://www.sciencealert.com/astrono...e-biggest-thing-in-ever-found-in-the-universe


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## Drone (Mar 18, 2016)

In archived NASA data, researchers have discovered "super spiral" galaxies that dwarf our Milky Way, and compete in size and brightness with the largest galaxies in the Universe. The unprecedented galaxies have long hidden in plain sight by mimicking the appearance of typical spirals.






*2MASX J08542169+0449308*, contains two galactic nuclei, instead of just the usual one, and thus looks like two eggs frying in a pan.






*2MASX J16014061+2718161* also contains the double nuclei.






*SDSS J094700.08+254045.7* stands as one of the _biggest and brightest_ super spirals. The mega-galaxy's starry disk and spiral arms stretch ~ *320 000 ly across*, or > 3 times the breadth of the Milky Way.

These double nuclei, which are known to result from the recent merger of two galaxies, could offer a vital hint about the potential origin of super spirals. Researchers speculate that a special merger involving two, gas-rich spiral galaxies could see their pooled gases settle down into a new, larger stellar disk - a super spiral.


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## Drone (Mar 23, 2016)

*Wolf-Lundmark-Melotte* is quite small and lacks structure, hence its classification as a dwarf irregular galaxy. It spans ~ 8000 ly at its greatest extent.
This small galaxy features an extended halo of very dim red stars, which stretches out into the inky blackness of the surrounding space. This reddish hue is indicative of advanced stellar age.






The dark cloud, known as *LDN 1768*, snaking across this spectacular image of a field of stars in the constellation of Ophiuchus is not quite what it appears to be. Although it looks as if there are no stars here, they are hidden behind this dense cloud of dust that blocks out their light.


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## Drone (Mar 25, 2016)

UFO hunter says face appearing in nebula *NGC 3324* was created by aliens. lolwut?! This is really amusing, beautiful picture nonetheless


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## Drone (Mar 27, 2016)

Dark nebulae:






LDN 673






This Herschel image shows the *Serpens Core*, the heart of a giant molecular cloud. The Core is the bright clump towards the upper right, with a more diffuse secondary cluster, named _*Ser G3-G6*_, shown at the bottom right. Also visible as a faint yellow glow towards the upper left of the frame is a region known as _*LDN 583*_ that shines brightly in the far-infrared.

Giant molecular clouds contain up to _10 million times the mass of the Sun_, and can stretch for _hundreds of light-years_. Compared to the rest of space they are dense, holding up to a _thousand atoms per cubic cm_ – and even more in star-forming regions. However, these properties are relative: even at their densest, these clouds are more than _10 times emptier than the best laboratory vacuums we can produce on Earth_.

These giant clouds are complex formations, most often made up of filaments mixed with clumpy and irregular folds, sheets and bubble-like structures. A typical spiral galaxy like the _Milky Way can contain thousands of them_, accompanied by many of their smaller relatives.


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## Drone (Mar 28, 2016)

Irregular dwarf galaxy UGC 4459


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## Drone (Mar 29, 2016)

I think I am the only still alive






This image shows a cold cloud filament, known to astronomers as *G82.65-2.00*. The blue filament is the coldest part of the cloud and contains 800 times as much mass as the Sun. The dust in this filament has a temperature of *–259ºC*. At this low temperature, if the filament contains enough mass it is likely that this section will collapse into stars.


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## Ahhzz (Mar 29, 2016)

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astr...r_hit_by_asteroid_or_comet_in_march_2016.html


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## Drone (Mar 30, 2016)

This image shows the optical and radio morphology of the radio galaxy *3C31* (NGC 383), the dominant galaxy of a prominent chain of galaxies. In this image, red colors depict radio emission measured with the VLA, and blue colors depict the optical emission from starlight. This system is a powerful radio source, with conical inner jets developing into wiggling jets and irregularly shaped plumes.

Astronomers believe that the jets are fueled by material accreting onto a supermassive black hole. The high energy particles are shot into extragalactic space at speeds approaching the speed of light, where they eventually balloon into massive radio plumes.


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## Drone (Mar 31, 2016)

Astronomers had previously identified G1.9+0.3 as the remnant of the most recent Type Ia supernova in our Galaxy. It is estimated to have occurred about 110 years ago from the vantage point of Earth, in a dusty region of the Galaxy that blocked visible light from reaching Earth. This Chandra image shows G1.9+0.3 where low-energy X-rays are colored red, medium-energy X-rays are green, and a higher-energy band of X-rays is blue.

It is important to identify the trigger mechanism for Type Ia supernovae because if there is more than one cause then the contribution from each can change over time, affecting their use as "standard candles" in cosmology.


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## Drone (Apr 1, 2016)

Astronomers have uncovered the signal of a *fast-spinning neutron star* in Andromeda galaxy. This peculiar X-ray pulsar is called 3XMM J004301.4+413017. It spins every 1.2 seconds, and appears to be feeding on a neighboring star that orbits it every 1.3 days.






Peering deep into the heart of our Milky Way, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope reveals a rich tapestry of *more than half a million stars*. Except for a few blue foreground stars, the stars are part of the Milky Way's nuclear star cluster, the most massive and densest star cluster in our galaxy. So packed with stars, it is equivalent to having a million suns crammed between us and our closest stellar neighbor, Alpha Centauri. At the very hub of our galaxy, this star cluster surrounds the Milky Way's central supermassive black hole, which is about 4 million times the mass of our sun.


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## Drone (Apr 1, 2016)

L1551-IRS5, which is about 450 ly away from the Earth, is believed to be a binary system consisting of two protostars. (A protostar is a cloud of gas which is collapsing prior to starting nuclear fusion at its core.) This picture shows two parallel jets (green) being emitted from a nebula (white, located slightly left of center), within which the protostars are located.

The jets are thought to be produced separately by each of the protostars, and extend for ~ 1500 AU.


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## Drone (Apr 8, 2016)

The elliptical galaxy NGC 1600, approximately 200 million ly - shown in the center of the Hubble image and highlighted in the box - hosts in its center one of the biggest supermassive black holes known.






A Hubble image of the Arches star cluster. Astronomers compared young massive gas clouds in the galaxy with the Arches and other more developed star clusters to model how these clusters developed.


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## Drone (Apr 9, 2016)

NGC 3576 & 3603


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## Drone (Apr 10, 2016)

_W3 is a region where many massive stars are forming in a string of stellar clusters, located about 6000 ly from Earth in the Perseus arm of the Milky Way. _Scientists believe that the extraordinary amount of star formation in W3 has possibly been influenced by neighboring W4, an inflating bubble of gas over 100 ly across. W4 may directly trigger the birth of W3's massive stellar clusters as it expands and sweeps up molecular gas into a high-density layer at its edge, within which stars can form. Another possible scenario is that W4's expansion has caused a domino effect of star formation, forming the cluster IC 1795 (seen as a clump of X-ray sources in the bottom left corner of this image) which in turn triggered formation of the young, massive clusters in W3.


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## Drone (Apr 11, 2016)

A nearby dwarf galaxy known as *Leo A*. Its few million stars are so sparsely distributed that some distant background galaxies are visible through it. Leo A itself is at a distance of ~ 2.5 million ly from Earth. _It's one of the most isolated galaxies in the Local Group_.






The star HD 44179 is surrounded by an extraordinary structure known as the Red Rectangle. Details are in the video:


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## Drone (Apr 11, 2016)

This spiral galaxy, *UGC 8621*, was identified by volunteers in the Galaxy Zoo 2 project as a spiral galaxy with a very small bulge at the center. Follow-up observations show that this galaxy also hosts a massive and active black hole at its center, a phenomenon previously associated only with prominent bulges.






Low Surface Brightness (LSB) galaxy *UGC 477*, located just over 110 million light-years away in the constellation of Pisces.
LSB galaxies like UGC 477 are more diffusely distributed than galaxies such as Andromeda and the Milky Way.
With surface brightnesses up to 250 times fainter than the night sky, these galaxies can be incredibly difficult to detect.
Most of the matter present in LSB galaxies is in the form of hydrogen gas, rather than stars.


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## Drone (Apr 13, 2016)

New VLT Survey Telescope image shows the central part of Fornax Galaxy Cluster in great detail. At the lower-right is the elegant barred-spiral galaxy NGC 1365 and to the left the big elliptical NGC 1399.







Did anyone try to download and successfully render 1.8 GB or 285 MB version? I had no luck


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## Drone (Apr 14, 2016)

Located in the constellation Auriga, IC 417 [*Spider Nebula*] lies ~ 10kly away. It's in the outer part of the Milky Way, almost exactly in the opposite direction from the galactic center.


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## Drone (Apr 15, 2016)

Composite image of the gravitational lens SDP.81 showing the distorted image of the more distant galaxy (red arcs) and the nearby lensing galaxy (blue center object). By analyzing the distortions in the ring, astronomers have determined that a dark dwarf galaxy (data indicated by white dot near left lower arc segment) is lurking nearly 4 billion ly away.






really old image of nebula NGC 2371


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## Drone (Apr 18, 2016)

NGC 4112 galaxy






NGC 4111 is a lenticular galaxy, lying ~ 50 million ly from us in the constellation of Canes Venatici. Running through its center, at right angles to the thin disc, is a series of _filaments_, silhouetted against the bright core of the galaxy. It's possible that this _polar ring_ of gas and dust is actually the remains of a smaller galaxy that was swallowed up by NGC 4111 long ago.


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## Drone (Apr 21, 2016)

I've never seen anything like this.






*Bubble Nebula [**NGC 7635]* is 7 ly across and resides 7100 ly from Earth in the constellation Cassiopeia.

The seething star forming this nebula is 45 times more massive than our sun. Gas on the star gets so hot that it escapes away into space as a "stellar wind" moving at over 4 million miles per hour. This outflow sweeps up the cold, interstellar gas in front of it, forming the outer edge of the bubble.

As the surface of the bubble's shell expands outward, it slams into dense regions of cold gas on one side of the bubble. This asymmetry makes the star appear dramatically off-center from the bubble, with its location in the 10 o'clock position in this Hubble view.

Dense pillars of cool hydrogen gas laced with dust appear at the upper left of the picture, and more "fingers" can be seen nearly face-on, behind the translucent bubble.

The colors correspond to blue for oxygen, green for hydrogen, and red for nitrogen. This information will help astronomers understand the geometry and dynamics of this complex system.










Bubble Nebula is being formed by a proto-typical Wolf-Rayet star, BD +60º2522, an extremely bright, massive, and short-lived star that has lost most of its outer hydrogen and is now fusing helium into heavier elements. The star is ~ 4 million years old, and in 10-20 million years, it will likely detonate as a supernova.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Apr 21, 2016)

isnt this the pic that celebrates 26 years of Hubble today?


https://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1608/


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## Drone (Apr 21, 2016)

^ yup that's the one, the link to Hubble site is in that post










Here's an old 3d gif of Bubble Nebula by astrophotographer J-P Metsävainio






And here's a 3D gif of IC 1396 nebula located over 2000 ly away, toward the constellation of Cepheus


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## Drone (Apr 22, 2016)

NASA tweeted out this photo on April 21, 2016, in honor of the musician Prince, who died that day at the age of 57.

The famous Crab Nebula recalled the late musician's most famous album, Purple Rain.







Crab Nebula, which lies ~ 6500 ly from Earth, is a supernova remnant - a structure shaped by the explosive death of a massive star.


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## Drone (Apr 22, 2016)

This new video from ESA's Herschel space observatory reveals in stunning detail the intricate pattern of gas, dust and star-forming hubs along the plane of our Galaxy. Against the diffuse background of the interstellar material, a wealth of bright spots, wispy filaments and bubbling nebulae emerge, marking the spots where stars are being born in the Galaxy.

The video was compiled by stitching together several hundred hours of Herschel observations. It spans a vast portion – almost 40% – of the plane of the Milky Way, where most of the stars in the Galaxy form and reside.

Denser portions of the interstellar medium, the mixture of gas and dust that pervades the Galaxy, are visible in orange and red, popping up against the background in this false-color view. These concentrations of matter, often arranged in long, thread-like structures, are the sites where future generations of stars will form.

The tiny white spots that appear sprinkled over the filaments are denser clumps of gas and dust, embedding the seeds of stars that are slowly taking shape.

In contrast, the glowing blue and violet gas is set ablaze by the powerful light emitted by newborn stars in their vicinity. This signature of full-fledged stars completes the inventory of all stages in the process of stellar formation that are portrayed in this stunning panorama.






The center of our Galaxy, ~ 25 kly away. Clouds of gas and dust appear distributed along a giant, twisted ring, > 600 ly wide, which encompasses the supermassive black hole sitting at the Galaxy's core.


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## Drone (Apr 23, 2016)

NGC 3576 is a giant HII region of glowing gas located ~ 9000 ly from Earth. Stars are born from condensing clouds of hydrogen gas.






Galactic Starburst Region NGC 3603
NGC 3603 is located in the Carina spiral arm of the Milky Way at a distance of ~ 20 kly (6-7 kpc).






RCW 120 bubble lies ~ 4.3 kly away.

A star at the center, not visible at these infrared wavelengths, has blown a beautiful bubble around itself with the mighty pressure of the light it radiates. The pressure is so strong that it has compressed the material at the edge of the bubble, causing it to collapse and triggering the birth of new stars.


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## Drone (Apr 25, 2016)

Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh Spitzer site/links/pics are not accessible anymore and I can't even edit my posts. That's why it's a good idea to save everything, duh anyway ...







*NGC 339* is a massive intermediate age star cluster in the southern constellation of Tucana. It's part of the Small Magellanic Cloud.

By measuring the brightnesses and colors of the stars of NGC 339, astronomers were able to estimate the overall age of the cluster (~6.5 billion years old). This makes it only half the age of the more common globular clusters. The relationship between massive intermediate age star clusters, such as NGC 339,  and the true globular clusters are not fully understood yet. So far none of these type of clusters has been found in the Milky Way.






Globular cluster *M10 (NGC 6254)* sits high above the plane of our Galaxy. Globular clusters consist of stars in dense groups bound together by mutual gravitational attraction, and gravitating as a whole around their host galaxy. M10 lies ~ 14 kly from us in the equatorial constellation of Ophiuchus.


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## Drone (Apr 25, 2016)

This colorful view of the globular cluster NGC 6362 was captured by the Wide Field Imager attached to the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory in Chile. This brilliant ball of ancient stars lies in the southern constellation of Ara.


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## Drone (Apr 28, 2016)

Yay Spitzer site works again. All links and images are accessible again!







The central region of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1313 viewed by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The galaxy is located some 20 million ly away and hosts a very bright source of X-rays, NGC 1313 X-1. NGC 1313 X-1 is an ultra-luminous X-ray source – a binary system consisting of a stellar remnant that is feeding on gas from a companion star at an especially high rate.





The irregular galaxy NGC 5408 viewed by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The galaxy is located some 16 million ly away.

Scientists using ESA's XMM-Newton have discovered gas streaming away at a quarter of the speed of light (70000 km/s) from NGC 1313 X-1 and NGC 5408 X-1, confirming that these sources conceal a compact object accreting matter at extraordinarily high rates.


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## Peter1986C (Apr 28, 2016)

Drone said:


> New VLT Survey Telescope image shows the central part of Fornax Galaxy Cluster in great detail. At the lower-right is the elegant barred-spiral galaxy NGC 1365 and to the left the big elliptical NGC 1399.
> 
> Did anyone try to download and successfully render 1.8 GB or 285 MB version? I had no luck



The large version? I succeeded but do not see the point of such a large picture on a regular HD screen, lol.


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## Drone (Apr 28, 2016)

Peter1986C said:


> The large version? I succeeded but do not see the point of such a large picture on a regular HD screen, lol.


It's all about being hardcore


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## Drone (Apr 28, 2016)

Astronomers have used data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, ESA's Planck and a large list of optical telescopes to develop a powerful new method for investigating dark energy, the mysterious energy that is currently driving the accelerating expansion of the Universe.

The technique takes advantage of the observation that the outer reaches of galaxy clusters, the largest structures in the Universe held together by gravity, show similarity in their X-ray emission profiles and sizes. *More massive clusters are simply scaled up versions of less massive ones*.






These latest results confirm earlier studies that *the amount of dark energy has not changed over billions of years*. They also support the idea that *dark energy ("cosmological constant") is the energy of empty space*.


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## Drone (Apr 30, 2016)

*Omega Centauri* (located 17000 ly away) is the largest globular cluster in the sky.  This group contains > 10 million stars older than the Sun and is 150 ly in diameter.








At the crowded center, stars may be as close together as 0.1 ly (note that our own nearest star is 4.3 light-years away).


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## Drone (May 2, 2016)

NGC 4394 is the archetypal barred spiral galaxy situated ~ 55 million ly from us. The galaxy lies in the constellation of Coma Berenices, and is considered to be a member of the Virgo Cluster.







Gravitational interaction with a nearby neighbor has caused gas to flow into the galaxy's central region, providing a new reservoir of material to fuel the black hole or to make new stars.


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## Drone (May 2, 2016)

Irregular galaxy NGC 55. The galaxy is ~ 7.5 million ly away and 70000 ly across.


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## Drone (May 5, 2016)

The center of our Galaxy, as seen in the radio​
As we zoom into the very core of the Galactic Center, our field of view shrinks to a mere 5 arcseconds (one thousandth of a degree). At radio wavelengths, the brightest feature of this region is the point-like radio source Sagittarius A*. This source is a compact object, and ~1 AU in size. Astronomers have seen _pulsation _of Sgr A* in the near-infrared, which they attribute to this radio source flaring.






Zoom Into the Center of Our Galaxy​New video by Hubble watch or download 720p


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## Drone (May 5, 2016)

The RGB image of Abell 665 merging galaxy cluster. Red color shows optical radiation, green shows radio and blue shows X-ray emission.

The shock to the north of this cluster is second in strength only to the Bullet Cluster shock. Shocks provide unique opportunities to study high-energy phenomena in the intra-cluster medium - the _hot plasma between galaxies_.

The shock is traveling with an astonishing speed of *2700 km/s*, ~ 3 times the local speed of sound in the cluster. By comparison, NASA's Juno spacecraft in 2013 became the fastest man-made object when it was slingshot around Earth toward Jupiter at a relatively pedantic 40 km/s.


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## Drone (May 6, 2016)

Galaxy *NGC 128* is viewed with its disc in an edge-on orientation in this SDSS false-color image. A _peanut shell-shaped bulge_ can be seen around the thin disc. Its inner peanut shell is 5 times smaller.






A zoom-in with the Hubble Space Telescope into the core of *NGC 2549* reveals the inner _peanut shell-shaped structure_ in this galaxy. Its outer peanut shell is 3 times bigger.


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## Drone (May 6, 2016)

M101: The Pinwheel Galaxy






This image was made from observations by all four infrared detectors aboard WISE. Blue and cyan (blue-green) represent infrared light at wavelengths of 3.4 and 4.6 microns, which is primarily light from stars. Green and red represent light at 12 and 22 microns, which is primarily light from warm dust.


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## Drone (May 8, 2016)

A cluster of newborn bright young stars in a rosebud-shaped (and rose-colored) nebulosity known as *NGC 7129*.

The star cluster and its associated nebula are located at a distance of 3300 ly in the constellation Cepheus.
A recent census of the cluster reveals the presence of *130 young stars*. The stars formed from a massive cloud of gas and dust that contains enough raw materials to create a thousand Sun-like stars. _In a process that astronomers still poorly understand_, fragments of this molecular cloud became so cold and dense that they collapsed into stars.

Astronomers believe that our own Sun may have formed billions of years ago in a cluster similar to NGC 7129. Once the radiation from new cluster stars destroys the surrounding placental material, the stars begin to slowly drift apart.


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## Drone (May 9, 2016)

Face-on spiral Seyfert galaxy *NGC 6814*.

As NGC 6814 is a very active galaxy, many regions of *ionized gas* are studded along its spiral arms. In these large clouds of gas, a *burst of star formation* has recently taken place, _forging the brilliant blue stars that are visible scattered throughout the galaxy_.


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## Drone (May 12, 2016)

This region is a site of active star formation, with new massive stars being born within the glowing clouds of gas and dust, as revealed by the Spitzer infrared telescope (red and green). XMM-Newton telescope shows that extended X-ray emission (blue) traces the stellar cradles. This X-ray emission is explained by the interaction between accelerated particles and magnetic fields present in ON 2.


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## Drone (May 13, 2016)

When the star that created this supernova remnant exploded in 1572, it was so bright that it was visible during the day. And though he wasn't the first or only person to observe this stellar spectacle, the Danish astronomer *Tycho Brahe* wrote a book about his extensive observations of the event, gaining the honor of it being named after him.

Tycho's supernova remnant was created by the explosion of a white dwarf star, making it part of the so-called Type Ia class of supernovae used to track the expansion of the Universe. The expansion from the explosion is still continuing ~ 450 years later, as seen from Earth's vantage point roughly 10000 ly away.

Since much of the material being flung out from the shattered star has been heated by shock waves - similar to sonic booms from supersonic planes - passing through it, the remnant glows strongly in X-ray light.



For the first time, a movie has been made of the evolution of Tycho's supernova remnant. This sequence includes X-ray observations from Chandra spaced out over a decade and a half.

The speed of the blast wave in the right and lower right directions is about twice as large as that in the left and the upper left directions. This range in speed of the blast wave's outward motion is caused by differences in the density of gas surrounding the supernova remnant. This causes an offset in position of the explosion site from the geometric center, determined by locating the center of the circular remnant. The size of the offset is ~ 10% of the remnant's current radius, towards the upper left of the geometric center. The maximum speed of the blast wave is ~ 12 million miles per hour.

The significant offset from the center of the explosion to the remnant's geometric center is a relatively recent phenomenon. For the first few hundred years of the remnant, the explosion's shock was so powerful that the density of gas it was running into did not affect its motion. The density discrepancy from the left side to the right has increased as the shock moved outwards, causing the offset in position between the explosion center and the geometric center to grow with time. So, if future X-ray astronomers, say 1000 years from now, do the same observation, they should find a much larger offset.


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## Caring1 (May 13, 2016)

Drone said:


> The maximum speed of the blast wave is ~ 12 million miles per hour.


 holy crap


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## Drone (May 15, 2016)

*Vela ring galaxy* is a bright core surrounded by a baby blue halo. Ring galaxies are created when larger galaxies are punctured by a smaller galactic aggressor, which, passing through the heart of its more sizeable victim, triggers a shock wave that spreads outwards. This pushes gas to the galaxy's periphery, where it begins to collapse and form new stars. Vela ring galaxy is unusual in that it actually exhibits at least two rings, suggesting that the collision was not a recent one.


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## Drone (May 16, 2016)

Image shows globular clusters encircling an edge-on lenticular galaxy *NGC 5308*, like bees buzzing around a hive. NGC 5308 is located < 100 million ly away in the constellation of Ursa Major.


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## Drone (May 17, 2016)

Birthplace of the suns: The *integral-shaped filament*, the two star clusters above the filament, and cloud L1641 in the south can be seen on these images of the Orion A star formation region. The picture on the left shows a density map compiled with data from the Herschel space telescope, the one on the right an infrared image taken by the WISE space telescope. The photo in the center is a combination of both images.

The observed positions of the star clusters suggest that the integral-shaped filament originally extended much further towards the north than it does today. Over millions of years, one star cluster after another seems to have formed, starting from the north. And each finished star cluster has scattered the gas-dust mixture surrounding it as time has passed.

This is why we now see three star clusters in and around the filament: the oldest cluster is furthest away from the northern tip of the filament; the second one is closer and is still surrounded by filament remnants; the third one, in the center of the integral-shaped filament, is just in the process of growing.

The interaction of magnetic fields and gravity allows certain types of instabilities, some of which are familiar from plasma physics, and which could lead to the formation of one star cluster after another. This hypothesis is based on observational data for the integral-shaped filament. It is not a mature model for a new mode of star formation, however. Theoreticians have first to carry out appropriate simulations and astronomers have to make further observations.

Only when this preparatory work is complete will it be clear whether the molecular cloud in Orion represents a special case. Or whether the birth of star clusters in a medley of magnetically trapped filaments is the usual route to forming whole clusters of new stars in space within a short period.


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## Drone (May 18, 2016)

LHA 120-N55 (aka N55) is an emission nebula situated inside a *superbubble* in the Large Magellanic Cloud .

The intense light from the powerful, blue-white stars is stripping nearby hydrogen atoms in N55 of their electrons, causing the gas to glow in a characteristic pinkish colour in visible light. Astronomers recognise this telltale signature of glowing hydrogen gas throughout galaxies as a hallmark of fresh star birth.

While things seem quiet in the star-forming region of N55 for now, major changes lie ahead. Several million years hence, some of the massive and brilliant stars will go supernova, scattering N55's contents.


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## Drone (May 23, 2016)

Astronomers have been able to detect carbon monoxide (CO) in the disc of debris around an F-type star named *HD 181327*. The star is a member of the Beta Pictoris moving group, located ~ 170 ly from us. The CO gas is found to be co-located with the dust grains in the ring of debris and to have been produced recently.

Source






*MACS J1149.5+2223* is a galaxy cluster located ~ 5 billion ly away. Galaxy clusters have a tremendous impact on their surroundings, with their immense gravity warping and amplifying the light from more distant objects.

Source


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## Drone (May 23, 2016)

Situated 8000 ly away in the constellation Vulpecula (Little Fox) the region in the image is known as *Vulpecula OB1*. It is a stellar association in which a batch of truly giant OB stars is being born. The vast quantities of ultraviolet and other radiation emitted by these stars is compressing the surrounding cloud, causing nearby regions of dust and gas to begin the collapse into more new stars.

Source


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## Drone (May 25, 2016)

Evidence that some _early supermassive black holes_ formed directly from the _collapse of a gas cloud_ has been found.


These results could represent a major step in the understanding of how the Universe's first giant black holes formed.


Two candidate black hole "seeds" have been identified, possibly at < 1 billion years after the Big Bang.


Astronomers combined data from Chandra, Hubble, and Spitzer to make this discovery.


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## Drone (May 26, 2016)

Astronomers have uncovered evidence for a vast collection of young galaxies 12 billion ly away in the constellation of Bootes. The newly discovered “proto-cluster” of galaxies, observed when the Universe was only 1.7 billion years old (12% of its present age), is one of the most massive structures known at that distance.

Green circles identify the confirmed cluster members. Density contours (white lines) emphasize the concentration of member galaxies toward the center of the image. The cluster galaxies are typically very faint, about 10 million times fainter than the faintest stars visible to the naked eye on a dark night.

The inset images highlight two example members that glow in the Ly-α line of atomic hydrogen.

The protocluster is massive, with *its core weighing as much as a quadrillion suns*. The protocluster is likely to evolve, over 12 billion years, into a system much like the nearby Coma cluster of galaxies, shown in the image below.


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## Drone (May 28, 2016)

ALMA image of the dust disk around *HL Tauri*


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## Drone (May 30, 2016)

10.5-billion-year-old globular cluster *NGC 6496* is home to high-metallicity stars. The cluster resides at ~ 35 000 ly away in the southern constellation of Scorpius.


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## Drone (May 31, 2016)

The golden veil of light cloaks a young stellar object IRAS 14568-6304.

Stars are born deep in dense clouds of dust and gas. This particular cloud is known as the Circinus molecular cloud complex. It's 2280 ly away and stretches across 180 ly of space. If our eyes could register the faint infrared glow of the gas in the cloud, it would stretch across our sky > 70 times the size of the full Moon. It contains enough gas to make 250 000 stars like the Sun.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jun 2, 2016)

Mercury and ISS transit the Sun


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## Drone (Jun 4, 2016)

9 dwarf galaxies in orbit around the Milky Way. Perhaps they were once part of a gigantic group of galaxies that – along with the Magellanic Clouds – are falling into our Milky Way galaxy.


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## Drone (Jun 6, 2016)

The drizzle of stars scattered across this image forms an irregular isolated galaxy known as *UGC 4879*.

This galaxy's isolation means that it hasn't interacted with any surrounding galaxies, making it an ideal laboratory for studying star formation uncomplicated by interactions with other galaxies. Studies of UGC 4879 have revealed a significant amount of star formation in the first 4-billion-years after the Big Bang, followed by a strange 9-billion-year lull in star formation, ended 1-billion-years ago by a more recent reignition. The reason for this behavior remains mysterious.


********************






Astronomers have spotted *Canarias Einstein ring* — an image of a far-off galaxy lensed by gravity — in the vicinity of the Sculptor dwarf galaxy.


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## Drone (Jun 9, 2016)

Composite image of *Abell 2597 Brightest Cluster Galaxy*. The background image (blue) is from the Hubble Space Telescope. The foreground (red) is ALMA data showing the distribution of CO gas in and around the galaxy. The pull-out box is the ALMA data of the "shadow" (black) produced by absorption of the mm-wavelength light emitted by electrons whizzing around powerful magnetic fields generated by the galaxy's supermassive black hole. The shadow indicates that cold clouds of molecular gas are raining in on the black hole. Each cloud contains as much material as a million Suns and is 10s of ly across.










While ALMA was only able to detect 3 clouds of cold gas near the black hole, the astronomers speculate that there may be 1000s like them in the vicinity, setting up the black hole for a continuing downpour that could fuel its activity well into the future.


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## Drone (Jun 10, 2016)

Wide-field view is centered on the _globular star cluster *M4*_ (aka *NGC 6121*) in the constellation of Scorpius. It's a color composite made from exposures from the Digitized Sky Survey 2 (DSS2).


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## Drone (Jun 13, 2016)

Scattered stars in Sagittarius






*The telescope on La Palma produces an image 10 times deeper than any other taken from a ground-based telescope and observes the faint stellar halo of one of our neighboring galaxies UGC0180, which is 500 million ly away from us.*


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## Drone (Jul 2, 2016)




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## Drone (Jul 4, 2016)

NGC 1569 is a small starburst galaxy located ~ 11 million ly away in the constellation of Camelopardalis. For almost 100 million years, NGC 1569 has *pumped out stars > 100 times faster than the Milky Way*!






An intriguing dwarf galaxy named LEDA 677373 is located ~ 14 million ly away from us. This particular dwarf galaxy contains a plentiful reservoir of gas from which it could form stars. However, it stubbornly refuses to do so. Rather than being stubborn, LEDA 677373 seems to have been the *unfortunate victim of a cosmic crime*. A nearby giant spiral galaxy M83 seems to be stealing gas from the dwarf galaxy, stopping new stars from being born!


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## Drone (Jul 11, 2016)

Starburst galaxy *MCG+07-33-027*

This field galaxy lies some 300 million ly away from us. The galaxy's spiral arms and the bright star-forming regions within them are clearly visible.


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## Drone (Jul 12, 2016)

At left, in optical light, UGC 1382 appears to be a simple elliptical galaxy. But spiral arms emerged when astronomers incorporated UV and deep optical data (middle). Combining that with a view of low-density hydrogen gas (shown in green at right), scientists discovered that UGC 1382 is gigantic (718000 ly across).
The center of UGC 1382 is actually younger than the spiral disk surrounding it.






Nebula NGC 6778 with the brightest recombination lines


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## Drone (Jul 13, 2016)

*IC 5068 Emission nebula in Cygnus*

Images by moonrocksastro  & Albert L. Ruppel






Spectacular new image of the Orion Nebula star-formation region. *This is the deepest view ever of this region and reveals more very faint planetary-mass objects than expected*.


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## Drone (Jul 14, 2016)

This image captured by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) highlights the Small Magellanic Cloud.  Also known as NGC 292, the Small Magellanic Cloud is a small galaxy ~ 200000 ly away.


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## Drone (Jul 14, 2016)

I've just learned that birds have Ultraviolet Vision so they can see Andromeda Galaxy in UV with their naked eyes.   Avian families rule!






Hot stars burn brightly in this image from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer, showing the UV side of a familiar face.






NASA's Nuclear Spectroscope Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, has imaged a swath of the Andromeda galaxy.










Close-ups of Andromeda Galaxy, taken with Subaru Telescope's prime-focus instrument, Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC).


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## Ahhzz (Jul 15, 2016)

http://www.sdss.org/press-releases/...axies-to-study-the-properties-of-dark-energy/


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## Drone (Jul 21, 2016)

NASA's Hubble Looks to the Final Frontier















In the center of the image is the immense galaxy cluster Abell S1063, located 4 billion ly away, and surrounded by magnified images of galaxies much farther.


**************






This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals the vibrant core of the starburst galaxy NGC 3125.

NGC 3125 is 15000 ly across. It's located ~ 50 million ly away in the constellation of Antlia.


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## Drone (Aug 1, 2016)

Globular cluster NGC 4833 located ~ 22000 ly away in the constellation of Musca.






Rippling wisps of ionized gas, named DEM L316A, are located some 160 000 ly away within one of the Milky Way's closest galactic neighbors - the Large Magellanic Cloud.


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## Recon-UK (Aug 1, 2016)

Cool thread only just seen this.


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## Caring1 (Aug 1, 2016)

Recon-UK said:


> Cool thread only just seen this.


There's a whole thread dedicated to holes, black holes.
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/black-holes.152580/


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## Ahhzz (Aug 5, 2016)

http://www.360pano.eu/show/?id=736


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## alucasa (Aug 5, 2016)

The beauty of the outer space is that we know God damn nothing.


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## Drone (Aug 10, 2016)

Irregular galaxy, known as NGC 2337, resides 25 million ly away in the constellation of Lynx

*******************






Open star cluster M18 lies approximately 4600 ly away in the constellation of Sagittarius.

Blue and white colors of the stellar population indicate that the cluster's stars are very young, probably only ~ 30 million years old.

The dark lanes that snake through this image are murky filaments of cosmic dust, blocking out the light from distant stars. The contrasting faint reddish clouds that seem to weave between the stars are composed of ionized hydrogen. Young, extremely hot stars are emitting intense UV light which strips the surrounding gas of its electrons and causes it to emit the faint glow.

Download mammoth *30577 x 20108* pixel image (*2 GB*)


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## dorsetknob (Aug 10, 2016)

Drone said:


> I've just learned that birds have Ultraviolet Vision


Insects also see well into UV !


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## Drone (Aug 15, 2016)

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has captured the glow of new stars in these small, ancient galaxies. *Pisces A *is on the left and* Pisces B *is on the right.

Astronomers estimate that < 100 million years ago both galaxies doubled their star-formation rate. An analysis of the stars' colors reveals that the galaxies contain ~ 20-30 bright blue stars. The blue color is a sign they are young, < 100 million years old. Each galaxy contains ~ 10 million stars.

In the image of Pisces A, at left, the bright object at the top of the image is a distant background galaxy. Other distant background galaxies are visible as bright dots.

In the image of Pisces B, at right, the bright object with the diffraction spikes below left of center is a foreground star in our Milky Way galaxy. Several distant background galaxies are also visible.







Several thousand years ago, a star some 160 000 ly away from us exploded, scattering stellar shrapnel across the sky.

This is the supernova remnant known as *DEM L71*. It formed when a white dwarf reached the end of its life and ripped itself apart, ejecting a superheated cloud of debris in the process.






These images show the edge of the vast *molecular cloud* that lies behind the *Orion Nebula*, 1400 ly from us.

The clouds are *stellar nurseries* and at their edge atoms react and form molecules by key astrochemical processes.


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## Ahhzz (Aug 15, 2016)

_Scientists have created the first map of a colossal supercluster of galaxies known as Laniakea, the home of Earth's Milky Way galaxy and many other. This computer simulation, a still from a Nature journal video, depicts the giant supercluster, with the Milky Way's location shown as a red dot._

http://www.space.com/33553-biggest-..._campaign=socialfbspc&cmpid=social_spc_514630


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## Drone (Aug 22, 2016)

NGC 5264 is a dwarf galaxy located just over 15 million ly away in the constellation of Hydra.

Dwarf galaxies like NGC 5264 typically possess around a billion stars - just 1% of the number of stars found within the Milky Way. They are usually found orbiting other, larger, galaxies such as our own, and are thought to form from the material left over from the messy formation of their larger cosmic relatives.


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## Drone (Sep 5, 2016)

This stormy scene shows a stellar nursery *N159*, an HII region > 150 ly across. N159 contains many hot young stars. These stars are emitting intense UV light, which causes nearby hydrogen gas to glow, and torrential stellar winds, which are carving out ridges, arcs, and filaments from the surrounding material.

N159 is located > 160000 ly away within Large Magellanic Cloud.


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## Drone (Sep 7, 2016)

*Oyster Nebula* (NGC 1501), a candescent cloud some 5000 ly away from us in the constellation of Camelopardalis.
Oyster Nebula is a type of cosmic object that is essentially a giant cloud of dust and electrically charged gases.


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## Drone (Sep 7, 2016)

*M98*, aka NGC 4192, is located ~50 million ly away in the constellation of Coma Berenices.

The galaxy's perimeter, rippled with gas and dust, is dotted with pockets of blueish light. These are regions filled with very young stars, which are burning at such high temperatures that they are emitting fierce radiation, burning away some of the dense material that surrounds them. In total, M98 is thought to contain *1 trillion stars*!






*Terzan 5*, located 19000 ly from us, is like no other globular cluster known.
There're two distinct stellar populations in Terzan 5 which not only differ in the elements they contain, but have an age-gap of roughly 7 billion years.


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## Drone (Sep 8, 2016)

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope finds a delicate flower in the *Ring Nebula*, as shown in this image. Located ~ 2000 ly from us in the constellation Lyra, the Ring Nebula is aka M57 and NGC 6720.


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## Drone (Sep 12, 2016)

Lenticular galaxy *PGC 83677*










'Enterprise' Nebulae Seen by Spitzer Space Telescope


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## Drone (Sep 14, 2016)

Zooming on the star cluster Terzan 5


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## Ahhzz (Sep 14, 2016)

Trying to find a copy of the map itself...
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/S...s_billion-star_map_hints_at_treasures_to_come
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...the-most-complete-3-d-map-of-our-galaxy-ever/


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## Drone (Sep 15, 2016)

Ahhzz said:


> Trying to find a copy of the map itself...


They'll release it towards the end of 2017


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## Drone (Sep 21, 2016)

This video zoom sequence starts with a wide-field view of the dim constellation of Aquarius and slowly closes in on one of the _ largest known single objects in the Universe_, the *Lyman-alpha blob LAB-1*. Observations show that the *giant 'blob' must be powered by galaxies embedded within the cloud*


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## Drone (Sep 22, 2016)

Ground-based wide-field view of the region around NGC 4889 [elliptical galaxy in Coma Berenices] (download full-size original image 166 MB)


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## Drone (Sep 23, 2016)

*ALMA Explores the Hubble Ultra Deep Field:*
*Uncovers Insights into 'Golden Age' of Galaxy Formation*

*








*​*
*


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## Drone (Sep 26, 2016)

*NGC 24* sits ~ 25 million ly away from Earth in the constellation of Sculptor. Most of NGC 24's mass - 80 % - is thought to be held within a dark matter halo.






This image, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, shows the colorful "last hurrah" of a star like our sun. The planetary nebula in this image is called *NGC 2440*. The white dwarf at the center of NGC 2440 is one of the hottest known, with a surface temperature of > 200000 degrees Celsius. The nebula's chaotic structure suggests that the star shed its mass episodically. NGC 2440 lies ~ 4000 ly from us in the direction of the constellation Puppis.


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## 64K (Sep 26, 2016)

Nice video on the Hubble Telescope

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/hubble-telescope-continues-to-amaze/vi-BBwvWiC


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## Drone (Sep 26, 2016)

Originally released as an IMAX film, "Hubble: Galaxies Across Space and Time" was named "Best Short Film" of 2004 by the Large Format Cinema Association.

4K UHD












The star Gliese 581


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## Drone (Sep 28, 2016)

This image of galaxy cluster *Abell 2744*, also called _Pandora's Cluster_, was taken by the Spitzer Space Telescope. The gravity of this galaxy cluster is strong enough that it acts as a lens to magnify images of more distant background galaxies.


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## Drone (Oct 3, 2016)

This Hubble image shows the central region of a spiral galaxy known as *NGC 247*. Lying at a distance of ~ 11 million ly from us, it forms part of the Sculptor Group.

NGC 247's nucleus is visible here as a bright, whitish patch, surrounded by a mixture of stars, gas and dust.


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## Drone (Oct 5, 2016)

Reflection nebulae *M78 & NGC 2071*

In the center of this image, two blue supergiant stars, called HD 38563A and HD 38563B, shine brightly. Towards the right of the image, the supergiant star illuminating NGC 2071, called HD 290861, is also seen.

M78 is located ~ 1600 ly away in the constellation of Orion.

Download original brand new image here  (~ 278 MB)


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## Drone (Oct 6, 2016)

An infrared image of the W43 star-forming region located 20000 ly away in the direction of the constellation Aquila.






Astronomers have discovered hyperluminous variable X-ray source located outside the core of its parent galaxy. This black hole (called XJ1417+52) likely has a mass of ~ 100000 Suns, and may have once been part of a smaller galaxy that merged with a larger one, leaving this black hole on the outskirts of the combined galaxy. Scientists refer to such objects as "wandering" black holes. These images show an X-ray closeup from Chandra and the optical full field image from Hubble.


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## Ahhzz (Oct 6, 2016)

Drag it around, boils and ghouls. this is an interactive video


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## Drone (Oct 6, 2016)

@Ahhzz  I've posted that video a few days ago in this thread 



Nice video by VOX


Hubble photo that changed astronomy


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## Ahhzz (Oct 7, 2016)

Drone said:


> @Ahhzz  I've posted that video a few days ago in this thread
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Sorry, didn't spot it. thx


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## Drone (Oct 8, 2016)

Composite optical-HI image of NGC 262, a Type 2 Seyfert Galaxy.

The cold, neutral hydrogen is shown in blue; the stars in the galaxy and the surrounding field are shown in red.


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## Drone (Oct 10, 2016)

Spiral galaxy *NGC 278* lies some 38 million ly away in the northern constellation of Cassiopeia.

Its odd configuration is thought to have been caused by a merger with a smaller, gas-rich galaxy — while the turbulent event ignited the center of NGC 278, the dusty remains of the small snack then dispersed into the galaxy's outer regions.


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## Drone (Oct 13, 2016)

Ancient stars, of a type known as *RR Lyrae*, have been discovered in the center of the Milky Way for the first time, using ESO's infrared VISTA telescope. RR Lyrae stars typically reside in ancient stellar populations over 10 billion years old. Their discovery suggests that the bulging center of the Milky Way likely grew through the merging of primordial star clusters. These stars may even be the remains of the most massive and oldest surviving star cluster of the entire Milky Way.


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## Drone (Oct 15, 2016)

6 new images containing Chandra data have been released to celebrate American Archives Month.






*Westerlund 2* - cluster of young stars - ~ 1-2 million years old - located ~ 20000 ly from us.

Radio galaxy *3C31* located 240 million ly from Earth.

Pulsar *PSR J1509-5850*, located ~ 12000 ly from us and appearing as the bright white spot in the center, has generated a _long tail of X-ray emission_ trailing behind it, as seen in the lower part of the image. This pulsar has also generated an outflow of particles in approximately the opposite direction.

Supernova Remnant *CTB 37A* located ~ 20000 light years from Earth.

Galaxy Cluster *Abell 665* generates extremely powerful shockwave. It's located ~ 2.2 billion ly from us.

Galaxy Cluster *RX J0603.3+4214* (_Toothbrush Cluster_) [located ~ 2.7 billion ly from us]
The stem of the brush is due to _radio waves_ (green) while the diffuse emission where the toothpaste would go is produced by _X-rays_ observed by Chandra (purple). Visible light data from the Subaru telescope show _galaxies and stars_ (white) and a map from _gravitational lensing_ (blue) shows the concentration of the mass, which is mostly (~ 80%) dark matter.


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## Drone (Oct 17, 2016)

*NGC 299* is an open star cluster located within the Small Magellanic Cloud just under 200 000 ly away in the southern constellation of Tucana.


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## Drone (Oct 20, 2016)

Using data from the 64-m CSIRO radio telescope in Australia and the 100-m Max-Planck radio telescope in Germany, an international team of astronomers has created a *detailed density map of neutral atomic hydrogen* in our Milky Way Galaxy.






The study reveals fine details of structures between stars in the Milky Way for the first time.

Very small gas clouds appear to have helped form stars in the Milky Way over billions of years.


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## cornemuse (Oct 20, 2016)

Dont remember where this came from, impressive. To me anyways.


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## Drone (Oct 24, 2016)

Close-up of the central regions of the starburst galaxy NGC 253







Youthful Globular Cluster NGC 362


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Oct 24, 2016)

cornemuse said:


> Dont remember where this came from, impressive. To me anyways.View attachment 80245




i dont think that picture is real.  The exposures wouldnt work.


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## Drone (Oct 26, 2016)

A 'radio color' view of the sky above a 'tile' of the Murchison Widefield Array radio telescope, located in outback Western Australia. *Milky Way* is visible as a band across the sky. Red indicates the lowest frequencies, green the middle frequencies and blue the highest frequencies.

GaLactic and Extragalactic All-sky MWA, or 'GLEAM' is a large-scale, high-resolution survey of the radio sky observed at frequencies from 70 to 230 MHz, observing radio waves that have been travelling through space - some for billions of years.






*Each dot is a galaxy*, with around *300000 radio galaxies* observed as part of the GLEAM survey.


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## Drone (Oct 27, 2016)

This time-lapse movie of the *Crab Nebula*, made from NASA Hubble Space Telescope observations, reveals wave-like structures expanding outward from the "heart" of an exploded star. The waves look like ripples in a pond. The heart is a neutron star, it has about the same mass as the Sun but is squeezed into an ultra-dense sphere that is only a few miles across and *100 billion times stronger than steel*. This surviving relic is a tremendous dynamo, *spinning 30 times a second*. The wildly whirling object produces a _deadly magnetic field_ that generates an _electrifying_ *1 trillion volts*.

The rapidly spinning neutron star is visible in the image as the bright object just below center. The bright object to the left of the neutron star is a foreground or background star. The movie is assembled from 10 Hubble exposures taken between September and November 2005 by the Advanced Camera for Surveys.


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## Drone (Oct 28, 2016)

This mosaic shows 18 quasars. Each observed quasar is surrounded by a bright gaseous halo. It is the first time that a survey of quasars shows such bright halos around all of the observed quasars.


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## Drone (Nov 2, 2016)

*Pillars of Destruction*

*Carina Nebula blasted by brilliant nearby stars*
*



*

*Region R44, R37, R45, R18, Trumpler 14*






*Bok Globule*






*Mystic Mountain* 
*
*


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## Drone (Nov 6, 2016)

Galaxies IC 2163 (left) and NGC 2207 (right) grazed past each other, triggering a tsunami of stars and gas in IC 2163 and producing the dazzling eyelid-like features there. ALMA image of carbon monoxide (orange), which revealed motion of the gas in these features, is shown on top of Hubble image (blue) of the galaxy pair.


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## Drone (Nov 7, 2016)

Galaxy *NGC 1222*

Astronomers think that it's in the process of swallowing up two much smaller dwarf galaxies that strayed too close to it.

Against the smooth background of old stars that was the original lenticular galaxy, we can clearly see dark filaments of dust and bright filaments of gas, both associated with the powerful star formation process.


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## Drone (Nov 29, 2016)

This delicate blue group of stars — actually an irregular galaxy named *IC 3583* — sits some 30 million ly away in the constellation of Virgo.












The Red Bubble: Supernova Remnant SNR 0509-67.5 [4K Ultra HD]


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## Drone (Nov 30, 2016)

That fucking image cache bug or whatever it is just ruined all images, I guess I won't be posting images anymore. Only videos:

Star Cluster Westerlund 2 & Veil Supernova Remnant [4K UHD]


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## Drone (Dec 6, 2016)

Brilliant video from the New York Times. Their Out There videos are really cool and Einstein is always right


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## Drone (Dec 12, 2016)

New observations with ALMA contain compelling evidence that *two newborn planets*, each about _the size of Saturn_, are in orbit around a young star known as* HD 163296*. These planets, which are not yet fully formed, revealed themselves by the dual imprint they left in both the dust and the gas portions of the star's protoplanetary disk.


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## Drone (Dec 13, 2016)




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## Seba_82 (Dec 13, 2016)

Drone said:


> This time-lapse movie of the *Crab Nebula*, made from NASA Hubble Space Telescope observations, reveals wave-like structures expanding outward from the "heart" of an exploded star. The waves look like ripples in a pond. The heart is a neutron star, it has about the same mass as the Sun but is squeezed into an ultra-dense sphere that is only a few miles across and *100 billion times stronger than steel*. This surviving relic is a tremendous dynamo, *spinning 30 times a second*. The wildly whirling object produces a _deadly magnetic field_ that generates an _electrifying_ *1 trillion volts*.
> 
> The rapidly spinning neutron star is visible in the image as the bright object just below center. The bright object to the left of the neutron star is a foreground or background star. The movie is assembled from 10 Hubble exposures taken between September and November 2005 by the Advanced Camera for Surveys.



This is the best a ever seen! thank you!!


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## Drone (Dec 14, 2016)




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## Drone (Dec 15, 2016)




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## Drone (Dec 15, 2016)

WFIRST is amazing! Go NASA!


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## Drone (Dec 19, 2016)

Located in our Galaxy ~ 5500 ly from us, *NGC 6357* is actually a "cluster of clusters," containing at least 3 clusters of young stars, including many hot, massive, luminous stars.

There are bubbles [cavities], that have been created by radiation and material blowing away from the surfaces of massive stars, plus supernova explosions.


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## Drone (Dec 20, 2016)

Bright spiral galaxy *NGC 4707*, lurking in the constellation of Canes Venatici, roughly 22 million ly from Earth.

Its overall shape, center, and spiral arms are very loose and undefined, and its central bulge is either very small or non-existent.


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## Drone (Dec 20, 2016)

*NGC 248* in the Small Magellanic Cloud


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## Drone (Dec 21, 2016)

Four Milky-Way-like progenitor galaxies (Top-left: ZFOURGE CDFS 467; Top-right: ZFOURGE CDFS 4409; Bottom-left: ZFOURGE CDFS; Bottom-right: ZFOURGE CDFS 6497) as seen as they would have appeared 9 billion years ago. ALMA observations of carbon monoxide (red) is superimposed on images taken with the Hubble Space Telescope. The carbon monoxide would most likely be suffused throughout the young galaxies.


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## Drone (Dec 22, 2016)

Colliding galaxy system *Arp 220* with its famous double nucleus


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## Drone (Dec 22, 2016)

false-colour view of Holmberg IX dwarf galaxy _(left)_ and spiral galaxy *M81* _(right)_


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## Drone (Dec 22, 2016)

*3D Map of > 90 000 Distant Galaxies Completed*


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## Drone (Dec 26, 2016)

*Megamaser galaxy* IRAS 16399-0937 aka LEDA 58817 or 2MASX J16424018-0943192






This galaxy is located over 370 million light-years from Earth and hosts a double nucleus.


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## Drone (Jan 3, 2017)

Interstellar filaments in Polaris 490 ly away.

Whether or not this currently calm region becomes a _stellar nursery_ in the future remains to be seen.


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## Drone (Jan 4, 2017)

New galaxy discovered!


~ 359 million ly away from Earth, there is a galaxy (*PGC 1000714*) that doesn't look quite like anything astronomers have observed before. New research provides a first description of a *well-defined elliptical-like core surrounded by two circular rings* - a galaxy that appears to belong to a class of rarely observed, Hoag-type galaxies.

While the researchers found a blue and young (0.13 billion years) outer ring, surrounding a red and older (5.5 billion years) central core, they were surprised to uncover evidence for second inner ring around the central body. To document this second ring, researchers took their images and subtracted out a model of the core. This allowed them to observe and measure the obscured, second inner ring structure.


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## DeathtoGnomes (Jan 4, 2017)

@Drone for a second there I thought the new galaxy was called Kerbal.


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## Drone (Jan 4, 2017)

This collection of highlights is taken from a new infrared image of the *Orion A* molecular cloud from the VISTA telescope. Many curious structures are clearly seen, including the red jets from very young stars, dark clouds of dust and even tiny images of very distant galaxies.


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## Drone (Jan 6, 2017)

This graphic shows all the cosmic light sources in the sky that are included in the *NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED)*, an online repository containing information on *> 100 million galaxies*.


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## Drone (Jan 6, 2017)

Astronomers have tracked a mysterious radio signal to a tiny galaxy 3 Gly from Earth.


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 7, 2017)

Earth and moon – as seen from 127 million miles away by NASA's Mars orbiter


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## CAPSLOCKSTUCK (Jan 10, 2017)

Herschel crater on Saturn's moon Mimas








The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Oct. 22, 2016 using a combination of spectral filters which preferentially admits wavelengths of ultraviolet light centered at 338 nanometers.

The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 115,000 miles (185,000 kilometers) from Mimas and at a Sun-Mimas-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 20 degrees. Image scale is 3,300 feet (1 kilometer) per pixel.


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## BiggieShady (Jan 11, 2017)

CAPSLOCKSTUCK said:


> Herschel crater on Saturn's moon Mimas


Ah, they dubbed it "Saturn's 'Death Star moon'" https://www.cnet.com/news/nasa-saturn-moon-mimas-death-star-wars-cassini/


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## Drone (Jan 16, 2017)

Peeking over Saturn's Shoulder






Image details:


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## Drone (Jan 25, 2017)




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## Drone (Jan 31, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 1, 2017)

Cat's Paw Nebula (NGC 6334, upper right [5500 ly away from Earth]) and the Lobster Nebula (NGC 6357, lower left [8000 ly away]).

Both are in the constellation of Scorpius, near the tip of its stinging tail.

These dramatic objects are regions of active star formation where the hot young stars are causing the surrounding hydrogen gas to glow red.

With ~ 2 billion pixels this is one of the largest images ever released by ESO.

Download original 5.4 GB image


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## Drone (Feb 6, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 7, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 8, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 14, 2017)




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## micropage7 (Feb 15, 2017)

Drone said:


>


beautiful


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## Drone (Feb 20, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 21, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 22, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 23, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 24, 2017)

Beautiful videos by European Southern Observatory


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## Drone (Feb 26, 2017)




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## Drone (Feb 27, 2017)

Located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, one of the Milky Way’s satellite galaxies, SN 1987A was the nearest supernova explosion observed in centuries and it quickly became the best studied supernova of all time.

The stellar explosion blazed with the power of 100 million suns for several months after its discovery on 23 February 1987.


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## Drone (Mar 1, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 8, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 9, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 11, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 12, 2017)

More Hubble zoom-in's


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## Drone (Mar 12, 2017)

.. and more


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## Drone (Mar 13, 2017)

ALMA observes four star-forming gas clouds in NGC 6822, a barred irregular dwarf galaxy, ~ 1.6 million ly away.


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## Drone (Mar 14, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 14, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 17, 2017)




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## alucasa (Mar 17, 2017)

Drone said:


> Cat's Paw Nebula (NGC 6334, upper right [5500 ly away from Earth]) and the Lobster Nebula (NGC 6357, lower left [8000 ly away]).
> 
> Both are in the constellation of Scorpius, near the tip of its stinging tail.
> 
> ...



Before I download the image, I want to know if GIMP can open or convert PSB (Photoshop Big). Googling hasn't come up with a straight answer.


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## Drone (Mar 17, 2017)

alucasa said:


> Before I download the image, I want to know if GIMP can open or convert PSB (Photoshop Big). Googling hasn't come up with a straight answer.


I open it with PSB plugin in paint.net.

But there's PSB plugin for gimp too. See here


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## alucasa (Mar 17, 2017)

Yummy, couldn't load it on my laptop with 8gb memory (6gb available).

Guess I have to get home to load it to make a wallpaper outta it.


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## Drone (Mar 23, 2017)




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## Drone (Mar 24, 2017)

__ https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10155048322437969


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## Drone (Mar 27, 2017)

ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) in the Chilean Atacama Desert






Two galaxies: NGC 4424 and LEDA 213994


----------



## Drone (Mar 28, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Mar 30, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Mar 30, 2017)

Two brand new videos from Hubble ESA


----------



## Drone (Mar 31, 2017)

Scientists have discovered a mysterious flash of X-rays using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, in the deepest X-ray image ever obtained.


----------



## Drone (Apr 4, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Apr 6, 2017)

*Massive dead galaxy found in the early universe*










This huge galaxy formed like a firecracker in < 100 million years, right at the start of cosmic history.


----------



## Drone (Apr 7, 2017)

A zoom into Abell 1689 and a very remote dusty galaxy


----------



## Antykain (Apr 7, 2017)

Every time I see these "Zoom into.." vids, it really quickly reminds me of how small we are (earth, or our galaxy for that matter), and how incredibly vast and expansive the rest of our  Universe actually is.  It's hard to even grasp just how big it really is.  The first time I saw the Hubble Deep Field, and then the ultra/eXtreme Deep Field shots , I was just amazed.  the Hubble was pointed into a one TINY point in space, like the tip of a needle in the night sky, equal to 1/13,000,000th of the total area of the sky.. and in this TINY spec of space revealed 5000+ different objects.  Most of which are galaxies.  galaxies..  

Hard to even think about when you consider what's else is in the rest of the area they didn't point the Hubble.  

This also makes me believe that we are definitely not alone in this universe.  With that many Galaxies in one small spec of the universe, let alone the rest of it, hard not to think we could be alone.  Scientists/Astronomers first estimate said there are at least 100-200 Billion galaxies in the Universe, with recent estimates put it above 2 Trillion galaxies.  It's said our galaxy, the Milky Way, is said to have 100 Billion stars on the low-end, and possibly upwards of 400 billion on the high-end.    Taking it further, it's estimated there are 100 billion planets in our Milky Way galaxy.  Of those 100 billion planets,  it's estimated there may be 8.8 billion of those would contain "earth-size" planets.. Kinda making it a given, in my opinion, that out of that vast number alone, there would have to be life out there somewhere..  Let alone the trillions of other galaxies.  lol..

Anywho.. just something to think about next time your doing some star gazing.


----------



## Drone (Apr 7, 2017)

^ Universe is (most likely) infinite and maybe it's not even single but just an element of a set of meta-universes where one cosmic epoch precedes the other forever and after.

New image of Gemini South telescope


----------



## Drone (Apr 10, 2017)

Starburst galaxy *NGC 4536* in Virgo (50 million ly away)


----------



## Drone (Apr 12, 2017)

Today's video is closer to home


----------



## Drone (Apr 15, 2017)




----------



## Basard (Apr 15, 2017)

@Drone 

Have you ever dabbled in astrophotography or owned a telescope?  I used to own an 11" SCT, you can have a lot of fun messing around with that if computers ever get boring.  The moon and planets are easy enough to catch, even in a light polluted city.


----------



## Drone (Apr 15, 2017)

@Basard  Nope unfortunately. Optics are pretty expensive and really hard to get. I should visit observatory but don't know when and where yet but I'm gonna do it sooner rather than later lol


----------



## Basard (Apr 15, 2017)

Well, some optics are expensive.  For planetary imaging, you can get by with a decent webcam sensor or a cheap astronomy camera. 
You'd be surprised how limiting the seeing conditions are on the quality of your work.  Nine out of ten days it's the weather holding you back completely--depending on your location.  If you're in a good location, you can get by with some pretty cheap gear.  I sold my scope because it was just never convenient to set it up when the weather _was_ good.  I dove in big with the setup I had because I got a decent inheritance, then just got overwhelmed at the same time.
But then 'cheap' is a relative term I guess. 
Anyways, it was a good amount of fun while it lasted, for me anyways.  I guess the furthest I got into it was this:








It's a fifty-two frame gif, each frame represents about a minute of Jupiter's rotation.  So, in essence, it's a one-hour time lapse of Jupiter with Io transiting.


----------



## Drone (Apr 18, 2017)

supernova remnant W49B


----------



## Drone (Apr 20, 2017)

Tarantula Nebula


----------



## Drone (Apr 20, 2017)

In celebration of the *27th anniversary* of the launch of NASA's Hubble Space Telescope on April 24, 1990, astronomers used the legendary telescope to take a portrait of a stunning pair of spiral galaxies. This starry pair offers a glimpse of what our Milky Way galaxy would look like to an outside observer.


----------



## Drone (Apr 21, 2017)

Brand new Hubble video:


----------



## Ahhzz (Apr 21, 2017)

A view of Earth?  





and yes, that is the moon hanging out with us there


----------



## Drone (Apr 21, 2017)

Scientists discovered a supernova explosion, being lensed by a foreground galaxy.






The explosion named *iPTF16geu* can be seen left of the center of the image as a tiny red dot.


----------



## Drone (Apr 24, 2017)

the night sky above ESO's Very Large Telescope






TYC 3203-450-1 star and NGC 7250 galaxy


----------



## Drone (Apr 24, 2017)

The low angle of the Sun over Tethys' massive canyon, Ithaca Chasma (near the terminator, at right), highlights the contours of this enormous rift.
Ithaca Chasma is up to 100 km wide, and runs nearly 3/4 of the way around icy Tethys (1062 km across). The canyon has a maximum depth of nearly 4 km deep.


----------



## Drone (Apr 25, 2017)

Cassini Completes Final Titan Flyby


----------



## Drone (Apr 26, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Apr 27, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Apr 28, 2017)

Intermediate spiral galaxy NGC 2403


----------



## Drone (Apr 29, 2017)

4 galaxy clusters and Fuzzy Dark Matter


----------



## Drone (Apr 29, 2017)




----------



## Drone (May 1, 2017)

spiral galaxy NGC 5917


----------



## Drone (May 2, 2017)

Biggest infrared image ever taken of the Small Magellanic Cloud!


----------



## Drone (May 2, 2017)

A Wave in the Perseus Cluster 200000 ly Across


----------



## Drone (May 3, 2017)

North Pole of Enceladus


----------



## Drone (May 3, 2017)

Download 43223 x 38236 (4.4 GB) image

A sea of galaxies


----------



## Drone (May 4, 2017)

Cassini's First Fantastic Dive Past Saturn


----------



## Drone (May 4, 2017)

Cassini beams back images of Rhea & Titan from second “Grand Finale” dive












New Hubble image!


----------



## Drone (May 6, 2017)




----------



## Drone (May 8, 2017)

Hexagonal polar jet stream is the shining feature of almost every view of the north polar region of Saturn. The region in shadow now enjoys full sunlight, which enables Cassini scientists to directly image it in reflected light.


----------



## Drone (May 8, 2017)

Beautiful zoom-ins from ESO


----------



## Drone (May 10, 2017)

Cassini captured this view of bands of bright, feathery methane clouds drifting across Saturn's moon Titan on May 7, 2017.


----------



## Drone (May 10, 2017)

Crab nebula inspired me a lot. And now I can't be happier 

5 (Chandra Hubble Spitzer XMM & VLA) telescopes (from radio to X-rays) team up for a stunning view of the Crab Nebula:


----------



## WiseMe (May 11, 2017)

Amazing scenery! Love the blend of colors


----------



## Drone (May 12, 2017)

Cepheus B


----------



## infrared (May 12, 2017)

The Crab Nebula... that's freakin amazing!


----------



## Drone (May 12, 2017)

The Large (center left) and Small (center right) Magellanic Clouds are seen in the sky above a radio telescope that is part of the Australia Telescope Compact Array at the Paul Wild Observatory in New South Wales, Australia. _Image: Mike Salway_


----------



## Drone (May 15, 2017)

HH 212 - protostar with dusty disk


----------



## Drone (May 16, 2017)

*Orion Nebula* is a gigantic assembly of gases, shining with the light of young stars. These young stars, especially the giant stars “Trapezium,” emit intense ultraviolet light, irradiating the surrounding gas. The strong ultraviolet light destroys the molecular gas and converts it into high temperature plasma. The right image captured the radio waves emitted from the molecular gas. This image shows us exactly how and where the nebula gas churns as it is destroyed.


----------



## Drone (May 17, 2017)

ALMA image of the *AB Aurigae*

This image  reveals gaseous spiral arms (blue) inside a wide dust gap, providing a hint of planet formation.


----------



## Drone (May 18, 2017)

The image shows the jet, *HH 1165*, launched by the brown dwarf Mayrit 1701117 in the outer periphery of the 3 million year old sigma Ori cluster.


----------



## alucasa (May 18, 2017)

Looks pretty. Deadly to touch (if you can even reach).


----------



## connie (May 19, 2017)

Drone said:


> The Large (center left) and Small (center right) Magellanic Clouds are seen in the sky above a radio telescope that is part of the Australia Telescope Compact Array at the Paul Wild Observatory in New South Wales, Australia. _Image: Mike Salway_


I looked at this picture for 10 minutes! It is simply amazing one!


----------



## Drone (May 19, 2017)

lol more dishes then

















The ring of dusty debris surrounding the young star Fomalhaut now is complete.


----------



## Drone (May 21, 2017)

Large scale bubbles and arcs seen with MeerKAT show stellar nurseries (where stars are born) in the Milky Way. For comparison, the previous best image of this star-forming region is shown at the bottom, obtained with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA).


----------



## Drone (May 22, 2017)

This image shows part of bubble-like gas cloud Sh2-308 surrounding a Wolf-Rayet star named EZ Canis Majoris.
The intense radiation pouring out from EZ Canis Majoris forms thick stellar winds that whip up nearby material, sculpting and blowing it outwards.






This composite image of the *Hydra A* galaxy cluster shows 10-million-degree gas observed by Chandra in blue and jets of radio emission observed by the Very Large Array in pink. Optical data (in yellow) from the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope and the Digitized Sky Survey shows galaxies in the cluster.


----------



## Drone (May 23, 2017)

The orange celestial object in the center of the image is a giant galaxy 7 Gly away, which causes the gravitational lens effect. If you look closely at it, you can see that there are a blue ring and red arc around it. These galaxies are behind the object. The red galaxy is 9 Gly away and the blue galaxy is 10.5 Gly away from us. It's extremely rare for a single giant galaxy to have a gravitational lens effect on multiple background galaxies.


----------



## Drone (May 23, 2017)

Pointing the Very Large Array at galaxy *Cygnus A* for the first time in two decades, a team of astronomers got a big surprise, finding that a *bright new object had appeared near the galaxy's core*. The object, the astronomers concluded, is most likely, an *outburst from a second supermassive black hole* closely orbiting the galaxy's primary, central supermassive black hole.






VLA radio images of _central region of Cygnus A_, overlaid on HST image, from 1989 and 2015.


----------



## Drone (May 24, 2017)

Dishdance XD






The view of the center of our galaxy with a closer view of the object known as Sagittarius A*, the bright radio source that corresponds to the supermassive black hole.


----------



## Drone (May 25, 2017)

Saturn's hexagon


----------



## erocker (May 26, 2017)

Thread cleaned. Keep this thread to posting images in, of and around space as per the topic of the thread.

Thank you.


----------



## natr0n (May 26, 2017)




----------



## Drone (May 26, 2017)

@erocker Thanks!

Massive galaxy *M87*








This galaxy contains a giant black hole at its core that is producing massive jets of energetic particles.


----------



## micropage7 (May 27, 2017)

Drone said:


> @erocker Thanks!
> 
> Massive galaxy *M87*
> 
> ...


very ghosty effect


----------



## Drone (May 27, 2017)

micropage7 said:


> very ghosty effect


Radio and X-ray emission from ionized gas looks ghostly indeed.

Abell 1758 (composite and X-ray)


----------



## Drone (May 29, 2017)

Like sentries guarding the heart of our home galaxy, the ESO 3.6-metre telescope and the Coudé Auxiliary Telescope stand tall in this stunning ultra high definition photograph from the La Silla Observatory, situated in the southern outskirts of the Chilean Atacama Desert.


----------



## Drone (May 31, 2017)

New videos:


----------



## Drone (Jun 1, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 2, 2017)

*NGC 4388*

The extended pink filamentary structure in this image is due to gas ionized by the radiation from the nucleus of the galaxy.
The vertical lines are caused by detector saturation of bright objects.


----------



## Drone (Jun 4, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 5, 2017)

Boomerang Nebula is located ~ 5kly from Earth in the constellation Centaurus


----------



## Drone (Jun 6, 2017)

Dancing Luhman 16AB Brown Dwarfs


----------



## Drone (Jun 6, 2017)

*R Aquarii* is a system containing a white dwarf and a “Mira” variable red giant in orbit around each other.


----------



## Drone (Jun 7, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 8, 2017)

New video and image


----------



## Drone (Jun 9, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 12, 2017)

The blend of xenon found at the Comet 67/P closely resembles the primordial mixture that scientists believe was brought to our planet during the early stages of Solar System formation. These measurements suggest that comets contributed ~ 1/5 of the xenon in Earth's ancient atmosphere.






Iapetus is a world of contrast, with light and dark regions fitting together like cosmic puzzle pieces.






Jet and accretion disk in the HH 212 protostellar system


----------



## Drone (Jun 14, 2017)

On the right lies the faint, glowing cloud of gas called Sharpless 2-54, the iconic Eagle Nebula is in the centre, and the Omega Nebula to the left.

Download full-size original (Warning: Size = *10 GB*)


----------



## Ahhzz (Jun 14, 2017)

Drone said:


> Download full-size original (Warning: Size = *10 GB*)


That will be my new 3-screen background this weekend, thank you


----------



## Drone (Jun 14, 2017)

@Ahhzz  haha, not a problem XD

New videos:


----------



## Drone (Jun 16, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 19, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 19, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 21, 2017)

Acting as a 'natural telescope' in space, the gravity of the extremely massive foreground galaxy cluster *MACS J2129-0741* magnifies, brightens, and distorts the far-distant background galaxy *MACS2129-1* [top box]. The middle box is a blown-up view of the gravitationally lensed galaxy. The bottom box is a reconstructed image, based on modeling, that shows what the galaxy would look like if the galaxy cluster were not present. The galaxy appears red because it's so distant that its light is shifted into the red part of the spectrum.


----------



## Drone (Jun 26, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 26, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 27, 2017)

Big thanks to @Norton  for pinning this and other threads


----------



## Drone (Jun 28, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jun 29, 2017)




----------



## connie (Jun 30, 2017)

That is brilliant!


----------



## Drone (Jul 4, 2017)

Hidden Galaxy *IC 342*


----------



## Drone (Jul 5, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jul 12, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jul 24, 2017)

This beautiful clump of glowing gas, dark dust, and glittering stars is the spiral galaxy *NGC 4248*, located ~ 24 million ly away in the constellation of Canes Venatici (The Hunting Dogs).






~ 95 million ly away, in the southern constellation of Octans, lies an intriguing spiral galaxy *NGC 7098* — with numerous sets of double features.
The small, edge-on, spiral galaxy visible to the left of NGC 7098, is *ESO 048-G007*.


----------



## Drone (Jul 25, 2017)

Located ~ 24 million ly away in the direction of the constellation Canes Venatici, M63 (NGC 5055) is a large spiral galaxy with a beautiful spiral. It's also nicknamed the *Sunflower Galaxy* because the balanced whirlpool structure reminds us of a large flower.


----------



## Drone (Jul 27, 2017)

http://gizmodo.com/this-real-world-space-opera-lets-you-become-the-hubble-1797204080

New videos of Orion Nebula Cluster (highest quality ever) and don't forget to check gizmodo link (won't work in IE)


----------



## Drone (Jul 27, 2017)

Wide-field image shows the sky around the two interacting galaxies NGC 1512 and NGC 1510. NGC 1512 is clearly visible in the very centre of the image.


----------



## Drone (Jul 28, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jul 29, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Jul 31, 2017)

Hockey Stick Galaxy NGC 4656


----------



## Drone (Aug 7, 2017)

ESO's Paranal Observatory






dwarf galaxy NGC 5949


----------



## Drone (Aug 10, 2017)

Brilliant videos by American Museum of Natural History, New York.


----------



## Drone (Aug 10, 2017)

Latest space news!


----------



## Drone (Aug 12, 2017)

The Total Solar Eclipse What You Need To Know


----------



## Drone (Aug 14, 2017)

Thaumasia mountains  (Mars)






During the early evening of 7 August, a partial lunar eclipse was visible in the sky above the ESO Headquarters in Garching bei München, Germany.


----------



## Drone (Aug 14, 2017)

new Cassini's images of Saturn and Titan!











Perseid meteor shower


----------



## Drone (Aug 16, 2017)

New amazing videos:


----------



## Drone (Aug 17, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Aug 18, 2017)

Chandra X-ray close-up of Andromeda's core, with sources circled.


----------



## Drone (Aug 24, 2017)

Antares (α Sco) & Saturn goodness


----------



## Drone (Aug 25, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Aug 28, 2017)

Saturn (storm & rings)


----------



## Drone (Aug 29, 2017)

New!








































__ https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1707755685932271


----------



## Drone (Aug 31, 2017)

Yay, new videos!


----------



## Drone (Sep 1, 2017)

Wow


----------



## Drone (Sep 5, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Sep 6, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Sep 7, 2017)

New!


----------



## Drone (Sep 11, 2017)

New (true-color) amazing photo of Saturn and new HD video of September Solar Flare


----------



## Drone (Sep 12, 2017)

New!


----------



## Drone (Sep 13, 2017)

New!


----------



## Drone (Sep 18, 2017)

Yay moar space!


----------



## Drone (Sep 20, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Sep 22, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Sep 27, 2017)

Samus Aran must visit Saturn Nebula  (5000 light years away in the constellation of Aquarius) after its fierce UV radiation fades out


----------



## Drone (Sep 28, 2017)

GW170814 - gravitational-waves observed by Virgo & LIGO


----------



## Drone (Sep 29, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 2, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 2, 2017)

Freon-40 in space!


----------



## Drone (Oct 5, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 9, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 13, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 16, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 18, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 20, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 25, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 25, 2017)

Universe shouldn't even exist


----------



## Drone (Oct 27, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Oct 30, 2017)

Abell 665








This image was taken atop Cerro Paranal in Chile, home to ESO’s Very Large Telescope


----------



## Drone (Oct 31, 2017)

Massive galaxy cluster called WHL J24.3324-8.477






ISS videos


----------



## Drone (Nov 1, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 4, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 6, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 7, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 10, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 13, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 15, 2017)

Astronomers found that the red dwarf star Ross 128 is orbited by a low-mass exoplanet every 9.9 days.


----------



## Drone (Nov 16, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Nov 20, 2017)

Astronomers Have Found Milky Way's Twin

and more news:





































Autumn fireball






Sirenum Fossae, Mars


----------



## Drone (Nov 21, 2017)

Eleven dwarf galaxies and two star-containing halos were identified in the outer region of the nearby Whale Galaxy.


----------



## Drone (Nov 27, 2017)

Sculptor dwarf galaxy






Star formation in Chamaeleon


----------



## Drone (Nov 29, 2017)

#wow


----------



## Drone (Nov 30, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 3, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 5, 2017)

Triplet baby stars born in a spiral


----------



## Drone (Dec 11, 2017)

Crescent Nebula, Full Moon, Earth timelapses


----------



## ttom (Dec 12, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 12, 2017)

New stuff by Chandra X-ray observatory!


----------



## Drone (Dec 15, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 20, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 21, 2017)




----------



## Drone (Dec 22, 2017)

Some old stuff


----------



## Drone (Dec 25, 2017)

Galaxy cluster *RCS2 J2327* contains the mass of 2 quadrillion Suns


----------



## Drone (Jan 4, 2018)

Dwarf galaxy Kiso 5639


----------



## Drone (Jan 11, 2018)

Lots of cool stuff this week


----------



## Drone (Jan 16, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Jan 17, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Jan 22, 2018)

Globular cluster NGC 3201






M17 (Omega Nebula)
















Cartwheel Galaxy lies ~ 500 million ly away in the constellation of Sculptor


----------



## Drone (Jan 23, 2018)

1RXS J0603.3+4214 aka Toothbrush galaxy cluster











Betelgeuse is located relatively close at 500 light-years from the Earth, and it has expanded to 1400 times as big as the Sun, which is about the same size as Jupiter’s orbit in the Solar System.


----------



## Drone (Jan 27, 2018)

Rho Oph dark interstellar cloud infrared image + polarization spectrum






 starburst galaxy M82 with its large-scale magnetic field along the polar direction of the disk






How far away is Polaris? 
434 ly


----------



## dorsetknob (Jan 27, 2018)

Drone said:


> Betelgeuse is located relatively close at 500 light-years from the Earth, and it has expanded to 1400 times as big as the Sun, which is about the same size as Jupiter’s orbit in the Solar System.


Some people have speculated that Betelgeuse  is about to collapse and go nova or may have allready gone Nova
if it has we might be uncomfortably close to such a Stella event


----------



## Drone (Jan 27, 2018)

dorsetknob said:


> Some people have speculated that Betelgeuse  is about to collapse and go nova or may have allready gone Nova
> if it has we might be uncomfortably close to such a Stella event



Scientists estimated that if supernova occurs < 50 light-years away from us then it's 100% "game over". 

Betelgeuse is 500 ly and it will shower us with its gamma and X rays, hopefully ozone layer will protect Earth. 

We will definitely 'feel something' but 500 ly distance is kinda okayish to soften the blow.


----------



## Drone (Jan 29, 2018)

Spiral galaxy M106.  It is located 24 million ly from Earth in the constellation Canes Venatici


----------



## Drone (Jan 30, 2018)

This image of the dramatic star formation region 30 Doradus, also known as the Tarantula Nebula, was created from a mosaic of images taken using the HAWK-I instrument working with the Adaptive optics Facility of ESO’s Very Large Telescope in Chile. The stars are significantly sharper than the same image without adaptive optics being used, and fainter stars can be seen.






Astronomers using ALMA have uncovered chemical “fingerprints” of methanol, dimethyl ether, and methyl formate in the Large Magellanic Cloud.


----------



## Drone (Feb 2, 2018)

This image of distant interacting galaxies, known collectively as Arp 142, bears an uncanny resemblance to a penguin guarding an egg.


----------



## Drone (Feb 5, 2018)

Galaxy NGC 7252






Lonely barred spiral galaxy NGC 1559 lies 50 million ly away.


----------



## Drone (Feb 6, 2018)

HINODE Captures Record Breaking Solar Magnetic Field






Saturn's icy moon Rhea passes in front of Titan as seen by NASA's Cassini spacecraft


----------



## Drone (Feb 9, 2018)

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows a spiral galaxy known as NGC 7331. It's located ~ 45 million ly away in the constellation of Pegasus.
Its central bulge displays a quirky and unusual rotation pattern, spinning in the opposite direction to the galactic disk itself.






New image of Jupiter


----------



## Drone (Feb 14, 2018)

Latest videos by Hubble!


----------



## Drone (Feb 15, 2018)

New!


----------



## Ahhzz (Feb 15, 2018)

Drone said:


> New image of Jupiter



http://www.ispacea.com/2018/02/nasas-1-billion-jupiter-probe-just-sent.html


----------



## Drone (Feb 15, 2018)

New!


----------



## Drone (Feb 17, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Feb 22, 2018)

New Juno's images of Jupiter











Latest BigThink astronomy video:


----------



## Drone (Feb 25, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Feb 26, 2018)

Nestled in the young Ophiuchus star-forming region, 410 ly from the Sun, a fascinating protoplanetary disc named AS 209 is slowly being carved into shape.






Dwarf irregular galaxy IC 4710


----------



## Drone (Feb 27, 2018)

A false color Spitzer infrared image of the Milky Way's Central Molecular Zone


----------



## Drone (Mar 2, 2018)

Jovian 'Twilight Zone'


----------



## Drone (Mar 5, 2018)

Spiral Galaxy NGC 3972


----------



## Drone (Mar 7, 2018)

New space videos!


----------



## TheoneandonlyMrK (Mar 7, 2018)

Drone said:


> They said that it was seen in 1054 and lasted for two years. What we see now is all the radiation that left after the explosion.
> 
> So I think *actual* explosion happened 6500 (distance) + 1054 (when it was observed) = 7554 years ago  I might be wrong
> 
> ...


I would have thought it happened 6500 years before 1054ad and in reality we could now be getting fragments of it hitting us by now too.


----------



## Drone (Mar 7, 2018)

theoneandonlymrk said:


> I would have thought it happened 6500 years before 1054ad and in reality we could now be getting fragments of it hitting us by now too.


That's right, some light travels "longer" than the rest, it's called light echo, so we still see some stuff


----------



## Drone (Mar 9, 2018)

Saturn






Mars






Spotless Sun






A peculiar galactic clash Arp 256


----------



## Drone (Mar 12, 2018)

Silent night over Paranal






Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1015


----------



## Drone (Mar 14, 2018)

A new composite of the Crab Nebula with Chandra (blue and white), Hubble (purple), and Spitzer (pink) data has been released.


----------



## Drone (Mar 19, 2018)

Aurora Steve






Lenticular galaxy NGC 1277






Loops over La Silla


----------



## quirky (Mar 19, 2018)

He was such a great man!


----------



## Drone (Mar 23, 2018)

Leading Arm of the Magellanic Stream






New image of Martian landscape


----------



## Drone (Mar 27, 2018)

Spiral Galaxy NGC 5714






Chaotic web of gas filaments


----------



## Drone (Mar 28, 2018)

Latest news!


----------



## Drone (Apr 2, 2018)

*SDSSJ0146-0929* [a monstrous cluster of hundreds of galaxies]






*ShaSS 622-073*  [two galaxies at the very beginning of the merging process]






*Icarus* (MACS J1149+2223 Lensed Star 1) - the farthest star ever seen


----------



## Drone (Apr 4, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Apr 6, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Apr 9, 2018)

Galaxy cluster PLCK_G308.3-20.2






Lights over La Silla


----------



## quirky (Apr 13, 2018)

There is so much beauty in the pictures you post, at least I find one. This is what fascinates me. How can it be so beautiful yet complex?! Man, I wish I could see it with my own eyes


----------



## Drone (Apr 16, 2018)

Massive galaxy cluster PSZ2 G138.61-10.84 ~ 6 billion ly away






Paranal Observatory


----------



## Drone (Apr 20, 2018)

In honor of 28 years in space, Hubble released a spectacular new image of the Lagoon Nebula, also known as M8.


----------



## Drone (Apr 23, 2018)

Lenticular Galaxy NGC 2655


----------



## Drone (Apr 25, 2018)

*Lagoon Nebula*
























Rings of Saturn






New image of Jupiter's Great Red Spot


----------



## Drone (May 1, 2018)

Abell 2744






Milky Way






Giant galaxy cluster SDSSJ0150+2725


----------



## Drone (May 4, 2018)




----------



## Ahhzz (May 4, 2018)

For those who like to look at the non-celestials up there 
https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/home.cfm

So, does anyone know what Jupiter's moons are named for?


Spoiler



The practice was to name newly discovered moons of Jupiter after lovers and favorites of the god Jupiter (Zeus) and, since 2004, also after their descendants.[32] All of Jupiter's satellites from XXXIV (Euporie) are named after daughters of Jupiter or Zeus.[32]



Does anyone remember the name of the probe sent to Jupiter to check out the satellites and Jupiter itself?


Spoiler



Juno. Jupiter's Wife's name. They sent his wife, to check on him with his mistresses....


----------



## Drone (May 7, 2018)

RXC J0032.1+1808 - massive group of galaxies bound together by gravity







Sun


----------



## Drone (May 8, 2018)




----------



## Drone (May 10, 2018)

Coronal Hole Facing Earth






Labeatis Fossae, Mars


----------



## Drone (May 14, 2018)

Spectacular spiral galaxy NGC 1032

A handful of other galaxies can be seen lurking in the background, scattered around the narrow stripe of NGC 1032. Many are oriented face-on or at tilted angles, showing off their glamorous spiral arms and bright star-studded cores.


----------



## Drone (May 17, 2018)

Galaxy cluster MACS j1149.5+223






Sun






M108


----------



## biffzinker (May 18, 2018)

*A Pale Blue Dot, As Seen by a CubeSat*
*



*
https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/multimedia/images/21859/first-image-from-marco-b

InSight on Its Way to Mars from Mt. Wilson





InSight Mission to Mars Launch


----------



## Drone (May 19, 2018)

New image of Jupiter


----------



## Drone (May 21, 2018)

Two interacting galaxies — NGC 5426 and NGC 5427 — together form an intriguing astronomical object named Arp 271.






Galaxy cluster SDSS J0333+0651


----------



## Drone (May 25, 2018)




----------



## Drone (May 28, 2018)

Seyfert galaxy NGC 5643 (located 55 million ly from Earth)






 Cluster of hundreds of galaxies located ~ 7.5 billion ly from Earth.


----------



## Drone (May 30, 2018)




----------



## Drone (May 31, 2018)

New NatGeo Video 










Latest ESO videos 4K



















and some watchmojo stuff


----------



## Drone (Jun 5, 2018)

New videos: 














































IC 4870






Milky Way


----------



## Drone (Jun 8, 2018)

Alpha Centauri






Latest videos


----------



## Drone (Jun 12, 2018)

Martian snow






Galaxy cluster RXC J0232.2-4420


----------



## las (Jun 12, 2018)

There is no space. We live in a simulation.


----------



## BraveSoul (Jun 12, 2018)

las said:


> There is no space. We live in a simulation.


I knew it, is there a thread on it here?   this game is sooooooo realistic   lol


----------



## Drone (Jun 15, 2018)

This turbulent celestial palette of purple and yellow shows a bubble of gas named NGC 3199, blown by a star known as WR18 (Wolf-Rayet 18).






Stormy Jupiter






Abell 901,2


----------



## Drone (Jun 20, 2018)

Mars


----------



## Drone (Jun 22, 2018)

NGC 2440 nebula






Swirling cloud belts and tumultuous vortices within Jupiters northern hemisphere


----------



## Drone (Jun 26, 2018)

Martian landscape and Vesta






Globular cluster NGC 6139


----------



## Drone (Jun 29, 2018)

Nearby asteroids photobomb galaxy cluster Abell 370







Latest findings!


----------



## Drone (Jul 2, 2018)

RXC J2211.7-0350 (Massive galaxy cluster)







*First clear image of a planet caught in the very act of formation* around the dwarf star PDS 70. The planet stands clearly out, visible as a bright point to the right of the centre of the image, which is blacked out by the coronagraph mask used to block the blinding light of the central star.


----------



## Drone (Jul 4, 2018)

Like a July 4 fireworks display, a young, glittering collection of stars looks like an aerial burst. The cluster is surrounded by clouds of interstellar gas and dust – the raw material for new star formation. The nebula, located 20kly away in the constellation Carina, contains a central cluster of huge, hot stars, called NGC 3603.






At 5:42 a.m. EDT Friday, June 29, 2018, SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft lifts off on a Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Dragon is carrying more than 5,900 pounds of research, equipment, cargo and supplies that will support dozens of scientific investigations aboard the International Space Station.






This image of Jupiter's southern hemisphere was captured by NASA's Juno spacecraft on the outbound leg of a close flyby of the gas-giant planet.






This image of the Moon was taken by ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst from the International Space Station during his Horizons mission.


----------



## Ahhzz (Jul 5, 2018)

Let's explore a bit on our own, shall we?

https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/

https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/alien-worlds/exoplanet-travel-bureau/

for a non-official page....

https://celestia.space/


----------



## Drone (Jul 6, 2018)

@Ahhzz  thanks!

New videos:


----------



## Drone (Jul 9, 2018)

Located ~ 70 million ly away in the constellation of Pegasus, UGC 12682 galaxy is distorted and oddly-structured, with bright pockets of star formation.







Mars


----------



## Drone (Jul 11, 2018)

Mars


----------



## Drone (Jul 16, 2018)

The bright object at the centre of the frame is the galaxy cluster SDSS J1336-0331. 
The enormous gravitational influence of the cluster warps spacetime around it creating an effect known as strong gravitational lensing. 
This effect is very useful for studying distant background galaxies.






This image from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, acquired May 13, 2018 during winter at the South Pole of Mars, shows a carbon dioxide ice cap covering the region and as the sun returns in the spring, "spiders" begin to emerge from the landscape.


----------



## Space Lynx (Jul 16, 2018)

Drone said:


> Spoiler: nom nom
> 
> 
> 
> ...




oh yeah baby ~  keep'em coming
this thread has to give me my fix until 2021 when james webb goes up... please no more delays...


----------



## Ahhzz (Jul 17, 2018)

http://www.esa.int/spaceinimages/Images/2018/07/Every_point_is_a_galaxy




Sorry, could use a little more description...


Spoiler



At first glance this frame is flooded with salt-and-pepper static – but don’t adjust your set!
Rather than being tiny grains or pixels of TV noise, every single point of light in this image is actually a distant galaxy as observed by ESA’s Herschel Space Observatory. Each of these minute marks represents the ‘heat’ emanating from dust grains lying between the stars of each galaxy. This radiation has taken many billions of years to reach us, and in most cases was emitted well before the Solar System and the Earth had even formed.
This frame shows a map of the North Galactic Pole as imaged by Herschel’s Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver, SPIRE. As on Earth, astronomers define locations on a cosmic scale using a coordinate system. For the Milky Way galaxy, this coordinate system is spherical with the Sun at its centre, and provides values for longitude and latitude on the sky with respect to our Galaxy.
The North Galactic Pole lies far from the cluttered disc of the Milky Way, and offers a clean, clear view of the distant Universe beyond our home galaxy. In the sky, it is located somewhere in the northern constellation of Coma Berenices (Berenice’s Hair), a region that also contains an especially rich galaxy cluster known as the Coma Cluster. Serendipitously, the Coma Cluster is included in this map, adding over 1000 points of light to the tally of individual galaxies.
Herschel was active from 2009 to 2013, and used its instruments to study the sky in the far infrared. SPIRE was particularly well-suited to mapping large areas of sky, and observed the North Galactic Pole in three different filters simultaneously – such observations can be used to produce multicoloured images.
The image shown is a single-filter map obtained at a wavelength of 250 μm as part of the Herschel Astrophysical Terahertz Large Area Survey (H-ATLAS), and covers some 180.1 square degrees of sky. This used both SPIRE and another Herschel instrument, the Photodetector Array Camera and Spectrometer (PACS), to survey some 660 square degrees of sky in five wavelength bands and produce the largest far infrared surveys ever made of the sky lying outside our galaxy.


----------



## AltCapwn (Jul 17, 2018)

I'm not sure if this has already been posted, but here's an interesting website ; Astronomy Picture of the Day.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html


----------



## Drone (Jul 18, 2018)

New mindblowing videos:


----------



## Drone (Jul 19, 2018)

These six infrared images of Saturn's moon Titan represent some of the clearest, most seamless-looking global views of the icy moon's surface produced so far.






The most visually striking feature on Saturn's icy moon Tethys is Odysseus crater. An enormous impact created the crater, which ~450 km across, with its ring of steep cliffs and the mountains that rise at its center.


----------



## Drone (Jul 23, 2018)

Beautiful and lively spiral galaxy NGC 6744






The heart of the Milky Way






Jovian clouds






Moon, Mars, Station






Solar wind


----------



## StrayKAT (Jul 23, 2018)

I'm not sure "Jovian Clouds" sums that up right. Sounds more pleasant than it actually is.


----------



## AltCapwn (Jul 23, 2018)

I find that kind of funny that we think we can terraform mars to suit our needs, but we are killing our planet earth at this rate.


----------



## Readlight (Jul 23, 2018)

First people will live there like caveman.


----------



## StrayKAT (Jul 23, 2018)

Readlight said:


> First people will live there like caveman.



Worse. Cavemen at least had wildlife. And were smart enough to migrate away from forsaken places like Mars.


----------



## Drone (Jul 26, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Jul 31, 2018)

Gravitational lensing caused by SDSS J1152+3313






NGC 3199 nebula [12kly away from us]






Saturn


----------



## Drone (Aug 3, 2018)

Thin, red veins of energized gas mark the location of the supernova remnant HBH3 in this image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.






Tumultuous tempests in Jupiter's northern hemisphere are seen in this portrait taken by NASA's Juno spacecraft.


----------



## Drone (Aug 6, 2018)

Interesting read, thanks @dorsetknob 

https://www.msn.com/en-my/news/tech...ifting-far-beyond-our-solar-system/ar-BBLwrPD










































Comet 67/P Horizon






Globular Cluster NGC 2108






Roddy Crater on Mars


----------



## Drone (Aug 8, 2018)

Korolev crater on Mars


----------



## Drone (Aug 9, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Aug 10, 2018)

Yay, new videos!


----------



## Drone (Aug 13, 2018)

Jovian tapestry






A fulldome family portrait






Galactic treasure chest


----------



## Drone (Aug 17, 2018)

Latest ALMA and Hubble space images


----------



## Drone (Aug 21, 2018)

Titan and Tethys






Earth From ISS












Ice Confirmed at the Moon's Poles


----------



## Drone (Aug 29, 2018)

Java from ISS






VLT






Jupiter


----------



## lexluthermiester (Aug 29, 2018)

Drone said:


> Jupiter


What wavelength is this being captured at?


----------



## Drone (Aug 29, 2018)

@lexluthermiester  Visible light + color-enhancing


Other space related news:


Stars and Dust in the Carina Nebula (Infrared 4K UHD)  










China Built the World’s Largest Radio Telescope. Then Came the Tourists


----------



## Drone (Aug 30, 2018)

Comet 21P to light up the night sky in September

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has peeped its next flyby target: Ultima Thule

Thanks @dorsetknob  for these links


----------



## Drone (Aug 31, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Sep 4, 2018)

Lenticular galaxy NGC 4036






SMART-1 [Moon-orbiting probe] crash site






La Silla Observatory


----------



## Drone (Sep 7, 2018)

New Active Region Grows Up (Sun)






Hanging Sand Dunes within Coprates Chasma (Mars)


----------



## Drone (Sep 10, 2018)

SDSS J1138+2754 galaxy cluster is creating such a strong gravitational field that it's bending the very fabric of its surroundings. 
This causes the billion-year-old light from galaxies sitting behind it to travel along distorted, curved paths, transforming the familiar shapes of spirals and ellipticals into long, smudged arcs and scattered dashes.


*60 Second Adventures in Astronomy* (Voiced by David Mitchell )

https://www.youtube.com/course?list=EChQpDGfX5e7CSp3rm5SDv7D_idfkRzje-

Chryse Planitia, Mars (Pitted Cones: Possible Methane Sources?)






Bright spots on Ceres


----------



## Drone (Sep 12, 2018)




----------



## Space Lynx (Sep 12, 2018)

stop spoiling me senpai!


----------



## Drone (Sep 14, 2018)

Unlike most stellar explosions that fade away, supernova SN 2012au continues to shine today thanks to a powerful new pulsar.






Jupiter






Titan lakes






@lynx29 you're welcome senpai!


----------



## Drone (Sep 17, 2018)

Phoenix Dwarf






Comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner (September 10)






Elliptical galaxy 4860 (center) and spiral galaxy 4858 (left)

































ICESat: Space will get unprecedented view of Earth's ice










Thanks @dorsetknob for this info


----------



## Drone (Sep 19, 2018)

This image shows a massive galaxy cluster embedded in the middle of a field of ~ 8000 galaxies scattered across spacetime.















ICESat-2 launch






The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) took this snapshot of the Large Magellanic Cloud (right) and the bright star R Doradus (left) with just a single detector of one of its cameras on Tuesday, Aug. 7.







New videos:





















Magellanic Clouds











Some old stuff with NdGT


----------



## Drone (Sep 21, 2018)

New awesome BH video by NatGeo










@Ahhzz  Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy in Gaia's all-sky view


----------



## Ahhzz (Sep 21, 2018)

So many beautiful things out there....


----------



## Drone (Sep 24, 2018)

An odd-shaped formation of gas and dust at the centre of the Milky Way, captured by the far-infrared cameras on board ESA’s Herschel space observatory. 

∞-shaped loop, estimated to have a whopping 30 million solar masses, is made up of dense gas and dust at a temperature of just 15 K. Displayed in yellow in the image, it contrasts with warmer, less dense gas and dust from the centre of the Galaxy that appears inside the strip and is coloured in blue. Surrounding the loop is cool gas, painted in red-brownish tones.

The ring and its surroundings harbour a number of star-forming regions and young stars, which stand out in bright-blue colour in the image. The area is part of the Central Molecular Zone, a region at the centre of the Milky Way permeated with molecular clouds, which are ideal sites for star formation.

The Galactic Centre is located ~ 30000 ly away from us, in the direction of the Sagittarius constellation. It is a complex and dynamic place, with emission nebulae and supernova remnants – in addition to star-forming molecular clouds – surrounding the supermassive black hole that sits at our Galaxy’s core. The gas and dust in this region appears mostly dark when viewed through an optical telescope, but it can be seen clearly with Herschel’s instruments.






Galaxy cluster SDSS J1050+0017


----------



## Drone (Sep 26, 2018)

Sun: Two Wavelengths



















































Scientists are increasingly convinced that the best chances for finding microbial life on Mars is under the surface, and new research backs that up.

Shock waves from bombing raids on Germany during the WWII were powerful enough to alter the atmosphere at the edge of space, scientists have discovered.

Interesting read, thanks @dorsetknob


----------



## Drone (Sep 27, 2018)

@dorsetknob 

Hayabusa 2 rovers send new images from Ryugu surface
























Animation of a neutron star with 'impossible' jets



















Rotating globes from May 28 and July 1 show a global dust storm completely obscuring the surface of Mars.






Opportunity rover emerges in a dusty picture






Einstein’s theory still passes the test: weak and strong gravity objects fall the same way










Occator Crater on Ceres' Limb


----------



## Drone (Oct 1, 2018)

Globular cluster NGC 1898, which lies towards the center of the Large Magellanic Cloud


----------



## Drone (Oct 4, 2018)

Old video but anyway Abby Martin  =


----------



## Drone (Oct 8, 2018)

Barred Spiral Galaxy M95 (NGC 3351) located ~ 35 million ly away in the constellation of Leo.







Fierce Winds Quench Wildfire-like Starbirth in Far-flung Galaxy






CK Vulpeculae star-on-star collision takes the form of dual rings of dust and gas resembling an hourglass with a compact central object. 
A brown dwarf (a so-called failed star without the mass to sustain nuclear fusion) merged with a white dwarf (the elderly, cooling remains of a Sun-like star).
According to the researchers, the white dwarf would have been about 10 times more massive than the brown dwarf, though much smaller in size. 
As the brown dwarf spiraled inward, intense tidal forces exerted by the white dwarf would have ripped it apart.






A multiwavelength view of the field around the Milky Way's galactic center seen from the X-ray (blue) through the infrared (red).






X-ray glow (shown here in purple) emitted by the hot gas that pervades the galaxy cluster XLSSC006.

The cluster is home to a few hundreds of galaxies, large amounts of diffuse, X-ray bright gas, and even larger amounts of dark matter, with a total mass equivalent to some 500 trillion solar masses. Because of its distance from us, we are seeing this galaxy cluster as it was when the Universe was only ~9 billion years old.

The galaxies that belong to the cluster are concentrated towards the center, with two dominant members. Since galaxy clusters normally have only one major galaxy at their core, this suggests that XLSSC006 is undergoing a merger event.


----------



## Ahhzz (Oct 15, 2018)

I don't recall seeing this: very cool, I thought


----------



## Drone (Oct 15, 2018)

@Ahhzz  you can check related stuff here (first video in that post)


----------



## Drone (Oct 17, 2018)

This image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), shows a patch of space filled with galaxies of all shapes, colours, and sizes.






A team of astronomers used the VIMOS instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) to identify a gigantic proto-supercluster of galaxies forming in the early Universe, just 2.3 billion years after the Big Bang. This structure, which the researchers nicknamed *Hyperion*, is the largest and most massive structure to be found so early in the formation of the Universe [1]. 






The enormous mass of the proto-supercluster is calculated to be > quadrillion times that of the Sun.


----------



## Drone (Oct 20, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Oct 22, 2018)

Unbarred spiral galaxy NGC 5033, located ~ 40 million ly away in the constellation of The Hunting Dogs. 
The galaxy is similar in size to our own galaxy, at just > 100000 ly across. 
Like in the Milky Way NGC 5033’s spiral arms are dotted with blue regions, indicating ongoing star formation. 
The blue patches house hot, young stars in the process of forming, while the older, cooler stars populating the galaxy’s centre cause it to appear redder in colour.
NGC 5033 has a bright and energetic core called an active galactic nucleus, which is powered by a supermassive black hole.







This image from ALMA shows the area surrounding Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole that lurks at the center of our galaxy — highlighted here with a small circle. 
Interstellar gas and dust orbit the black hole at high speeds.







The BepiColombo Mercury Transfer Module (MTM) has returned its first images from space.


----------



## Drone (Oct 23, 2018)

/random


----------



## Drone (Oct 24, 2018)

Newborn Stars Blow Bubbles in the Cat's Paw Nebula


----------



## Drone (Oct 26, 2018)

This striking view of layered sediments on Mars was captured by the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter’s Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System, CaSSIS, on 2 October 2018. 





A swirling, oval white cloud in Jupiter's South Temperate Belt is captured in this image from NASA's Juno spacecraft.





On Sept. 25, 2018, Parker Solar Probe captured a view of Earth as it sped toward the first Venus gravity assist of the mission. Earth is the bright, round object visible in the right side of this image, taken by Parker Solar Probe's Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe (WISPR) instrument. The elongated mark toward the bottom of the panel is a lens reflection from the WISPR instrument.


----------



## Drone (Oct 29, 2018)

This perspective view shows Greeley Crater, a degraded impact crater located in the Southern Highlands of Mars.


----------



## Drone (Oct 31, 2018)

Perseus


----------



## Drone (Nov 1, 2018)

In a stellar nursery called the Serpens Nebula, ~ 1300 ly away, a young star's game of shadow play is revealing secrets of its unseen planet-forming disk. The near-infrared vision of NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captured the shadow cast by the fledgling star's brilliant light being blocked by this disk. Named HBC 672, this Sun-like star is surrounded by a debris ring of dust, rock and ice — a disk that is too small and too distant to be seen, even by Hubble. But like a little fly that wanders into the beam of a flashlight shining on a wall, its shadow is projected large upon the cloud in which it was born.







Witch Head Nebula







Solar Prominence


----------



## Drone (Nov 3, 2018)

@Ahhzz  & @dorsetknob  check this latest The New York Times video 












Six Galaxy Cluster Collisions


----------



## Ahhzz (Nov 3, 2018)

Very nice find!! cool vid


----------



## Drone (Nov 6, 2018)

Mysterious Interstellar Object 'Oumuamua Might Be An Alien Lightsail Spacecraft, Astrophysicists Say
Eh what?
















Polar lights on Uranus




ISS




Abell 2597




ESO 338-4 - blue compact lonely dwarf galaxy, a staggering 100 million ly away from us


----------



## Drone (Nov 7, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Nov 10, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Nov 13, 2018)




----------



## lexluthermiester (Nov 13, 2018)

Drone said:


> Witch Head Nebula


Always found this creepy. LOL!



Drone said:


>


That link seems to be dead.


----------



## Drone (Nov 13, 2018)

lexluthermiester said:


> Always found this creepy. LOL!
> 
> 
> That link seems to be dead.



Yup, ESO remove their videos pretty often. The image for that video is here

https://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1846a/


----------



## Drone (Nov 15, 2018)

Exoplanet discovered around Barnard's star

thanks for link @dorsetknob


----------



## Drone (Nov 16, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Nov 19, 2018)

NGC 1866






Rosette Nebula


----------



## Drone (Nov 22, 2018)

Perspective view of Nili Fossae, Mars






ISS


----------



## Drone (Nov 23, 2018)

New!


----------



## Drone (Nov 26, 2018)

The Galactic Centre above the ESO 3.6-metre telescope






Mars


----------



## Drone (Nov 27, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Nov 30, 2018)

Latest/Greatest mindblowing stuff


----------



## Drone (Dec 3, 2018)

Scientists detect biggest known black-hole collision

'Dolphin' in the Jovian Clouds


----------



## Drone (Dec 6, 2018)

Newest Crew Launches for ISS


----------



## Drone (Dec 10, 2018)

Star cluster Westerlund 1







Binary Star System R Aquarii, located 700 ly from Earth






Jupiter's North Equatorial Belt






Carina Nebula






Horsehead nebula






Southern Pinwheel Galaxy M83






A *grand design spiral galaxy* M100


----------



## Drone (Dec 12, 2018)

Dione and Rhea appear as one






R Aquarii


----------



## Drone (Dec 25, 2018)




----------



## Drone (Jan 3, 2019)

@dorsetknob 

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46724727
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46742298


----------



## xtreemchaos (Jan 3, 2019)

heres a few of my shots taken from my Obsy in south wales uk


















if you would like to see more of my work heres a link to my flickr page https://www.flickr.com/photos/xtreemchaos/page1
clear skys. charl.


----------



## Drone (Jan 3, 2019)

@xtreemchaos cool images, thanks!


----------



## xtreemchaos (Jan 3, 2019)

Drone your welcome mate.


----------



## Drone (Jan 7, 2019)

The object in the image, G54.1+0.3, is a supernova remnant, the leftovers of a massive star that died a violent death. It's located ~ 20000 ly away from us, in the northern constellation of Sagitta, the arrow.






Set against a dark sky littered with galaxies, this image shows spiral galazy M61 in its full glory — even at its distance of over 50 million ly.






The object in the image elliptical galaxy M105 lies about 30 million ly away in the constellation of Leo. The stars near the M105’s center are moving around a supermassive black hole with an estimated mass of 200 million Suns.


----------



## Space Lynx (Jan 7, 2019)

thanks Drone you never disappoint with this thread. I just hope I live long enough to see the James Webb send back several images, many discoveries await us - I hope.


----------



## Drone (Jan 8, 2019)

You're welcome lynx29







This spectacular spiral galaxy, known as NGC 1964, resides ~ 70 million ly away in the constellation of Lepus (The Hare).















































Citizen Scientists Find New World with NASA Telescope

Located 226 ly away in the constellation Taurus, the planet lies in a stellar system known as K2-288, which contains a pair of dim, cool M-type stars separated by ~ 8.2 billion km - roughly 6 times the distance between Saturn and the Sun. The brighter star is about 1/2 as massive and large as the Sun, while its companion is about 1/3 the Sun's mass and size. The new planet, K2-288Bb, orbits the smaller, dimmer star every 31.3 days.


----------



## xtreemchaos (Jan 8, 2019)

K2-288Bb 31 day orbit its enough to make your head spin eh . im sat at my solar scope hoping for a gap in the cloud to get a few solar shots but nothing doing yet. charl.


----------



## Drone (Jan 10, 2019)

Latest discoveries from space


----------



## Drone (Jan 22, 2019)

Jupiter






Saturn


----------



## Drone (Jan 29, 2019)




----------



## Drone (Feb 5, 2019)

Insight, Mars






Juno, Jupiter







Latest and greatest cool stuff


----------



## Drone (Feb 6, 2019)




----------



## Drone (Feb 8, 2019)




----------



## Drone (Feb 14, 2019)




----------



## Drone (Feb 23, 2019)

Jupiter






Mars


----------



## Drone (Mar 1, 2019)

Galaxy NGC 6902






In the nearby Whirlpool galaxy and its companion galaxy, M51b, two supermassive black holes heat up and devour surrounding material.


----------



## Drone (Mar 4, 2019)

Space goodness for today


----------



## Drone (Mar 9, 2019)

Mars






Jupiter






Ultima Thule


----------



## ArbitraryAffection (Mar 9, 2019)

Oh wow super awesome thread. Going to watch it.  I love space, and astronomy. It's one of my favourite subjects. One day we're going to explore the stars. I just wish i would be alive to see it 



xtreemchaos said:


> heres a few of my shots taken from my Obsy in south wales uk
> View attachment 113908
> View attachment 113907
> View attachment 113906
> ...


Omg! I'm subbing to your flickr.  excellent work


----------



## xtreemchaos (Mar 9, 2019)

ArbitraryAffection thanks , its a little hobby of mine ive been doing since i was about six years old, well for the past 10 years since i retired its grown into a full time job. the stargazers lounge is the place where us astro junkes hang out  if you would like to dive deeper. charl.


----------



## ArbitraryAffection (Mar 9, 2019)

xtreemchaos said:


> ArbitraryAffection thanks , its a little hobby of mine ive been doing since i was about six years old, well for the past 10 years since i retired its grown into a full time job. the stargazers lounge is the place where us astro junkes hang out  if you would like to dive deeper. charl.


I am absolutely going to maybe come and visit. I have anxiety so it may take a while. Space is one of those subjects that makes the hair on my neck stand up. So much mystery, so many unanswered questions, and about our place in this magnificent existence.

Stargazers lounge, where is that? thx


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## xtreemchaos (Mar 9, 2019)

https://stargazerslounge.com/?_fromLogin=1   the link isnt working, if you copy it into you brouser it will take you to the site. im a Aspey so im allways suffering from a bit of anxiety too, but on the stargazerslounge everybodys great. yes space is a wonderfull place what nobody truly understands, we are living on a rock near to a M class star which is the most wonderfull ever changing dynamic object to watch and we have a front seat to watch it. charl.


----------



## ArbitraryAffection (Mar 9, 2019)

xtreemchaos said:


> im a Aspey.


Asperger's? Me too :3


----------



## xtreemchaos (Mar 9, 2019)

yer were human mk 2


----------



## ArbitraryAffection (Mar 9, 2019)

xtreemchaos said:


> yer were human mk 2


Yesss >:3


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## xtreemchaos (Mar 9, 2019)

ive got to go wifes shouting me for breakfast, ill catch ya later. charl.


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## Drone (Mar 9, 2019)

Martin Rees always got something cool to say


----------



## Drone (Mar 14, 2019)

NGC 1788


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## Drone (Mar 15, 2019)

Latest mind-blowing space goodness:

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft shows a wide shot and two close-ups of a region in asteroid *Bennu*’s northern hemisphere.






This remarkable image was taken in the Terra Sabaea region of *Mars*, west of Augakuh Vallis, by the Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) onboard the ESA-Roscosmos ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter.


----------



## Drone (Mar 20, 2019)




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## Drone (Mar 23, 2019)

Waxing Gibbous Moon Above Earth's Limb






Asteroid Bennu






Galactic Center (with Sagittarius A*)






Jupiter


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## Drone (Mar 27, 2019)

Fuzzy orb of light is a giant elliptical galaxy M49 filled with 200 billion stars. Unlike spiral galaxies, which have a well-defined structure and boast picturesque spiral arms, elliptical galaxies appear fairly smooth and featureless. At a distance of 56 million ly and measuring 157000 ly across, M49 was the first member of the Virgo Cluster of galaxies to be discovered, and it is more luminous than any other galaxy at its distance or nearer.






M11 open star cluster in the southern constellation of the Shield.






NASA's First Image of Mars from a CubeSat (Oct. 2-3 2018)






New videos:


----------



## Drone (May 22, 2019)




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## Drone (May 31, 2019)

Cool stuff:




























Galaxy NGC 4621


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## lexluthermiester (May 31, 2019)

@ the picture above, notice the other galaxies off to the lower right. Those galaxies look like they are near to each other. They are in fact 5ish million light years apart, and one is very much larger than the other.


----------



## R-T-B (Jun 1, 2019)

lexluthermiester said:


> @the picture above, notice the other galaxies off to the lower right. Those galaxies look like they are near each. They are in fact 5ish million light years apart, and one is very much larger than the other.



Reminds me of one of my Elite photos.

I call it Guess Which Star is Closer?  It illustrates the concept well.






Yep, the little one is in fact closer.  That's just a big-big-big red giant.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jun 1, 2019)

R-T-B said:


> Reminds me of one of my Elite photos.
> 
> I call it Guess Which Star is Closer?  It illustrates the concept well.
> 
> ...


Good illustration!


----------



## Drone (Jun 8, 2019)

Barred spiral galaxy NGC 7773






Venus at Sunrise From the ISS






From Day Into Night on the ISS


----------



## Drone (Jun 13, 2019)

Aurora from ISS


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## Drone (Jun 17, 2019)

South Korean astronomers have discovered a mid-sized black hole at the core of a small galaxy










Irregular galaxy IC 10






A false-color image mosaic shows Daphnis, one of Saturn's ring-embedded moons, and the waves it kicks up in the Keeler gap.


----------



## Drone (Jun 26, 2019)

Jupiter


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## Drone (Jun 29, 2019)

Spiral galaxy M98 located ~ 45 million ly away in the constellation of Coma Berenices. It is estimated to contain about a trillion of stars.






This image from ESA’s Mars Express shows Aurorae Chaos, a large area of chaotic terrain located in the Margaritifer Terra region on Mars.


----------



## Drone (Jul 1, 2019)




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## Drone (Jul 3, 2019)

This image – combined of many exposures – captures 'totality' during the 2 July 2019 total solar eclipse, the moment that the Moon passes directly in front of the Sun from Earth's perspective, blocking out its light and allowing the Sun's extended atmosphere – the corona – to be seen. The processing of this image highlights the intricate detail of the corona, its structures shaped by the Sun's magnetic field. Some details of the lunar surface can also be seen. The image was created by the ESA-CESAR team observing the eclipse from ESO's La Silla Observatory in Chile, South America.


----------



## Drone (Jul 19, 2019)

Juno spacecraft captured this view of an area within a Jovian jet stream showing a vortex that has an intensely dark center







This 8-image mosaic is of Sojourner, NASA's first rover on Mars. [July 4, 1997]






Spiral galaxy NGC 2985 lies > 70 million light years from the Solar System in the constellation of Ursa Major (The Great Bear).


----------



## Drone (Aug 1, 2019)

NGC 3169 is located ~ 70 million light-years away in the constellation of Sextans. It's part of the Leo I Group of galaxies, which, like the Local Group that houses our home galaxy, the Milky Way, is part of a larger galactic congregation known as the Virgo Supercluster.






ISS







Ahuna Mons on Ceres

This mountain rises to an elevation of 4 km at its peak – Europe’s Mont Blanc on Earth would rise slightly above it (as measured from sea level) – and is marked by numerous bright streaks that run down its flanks.


----------



## kapone32 (Aug 1, 2019)

On an anecdotal note. I love images of space and it's details on my 4K monitor( especially Nebula and Galaxies). There is so much detail to be seen that it is absolutely hypnotic.


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## lexluthermiester (Aug 2, 2019)

kapone32 said:


> On an anecdotal note. I love images of space and it's details on my 4K monitor( especially Nebula and Galaxies). There is so much detail to be seen that it is absolutely hypnotic.


One of the great things about 4k displays. Game framerates suffer, but oh do high-res pictures pop!


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## kapone32 (Aug 2, 2019)

lexluthermiester said:


> One of the great things about 4k displays. Game framerates suffer, but oh do high-res pictures pop!



Exactly I have a gallery of Galaxies on my desktop and when I looked at the Sombrero galaxy I thought It was a smudge on my screen until I realized it was a star creating a solar system!


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## Drone (Aug 2, 2019)

Jupiter


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## Drone (Aug 5, 2019)

This image shows a snippet of the Sun up close, revealing a golden surface marked by a number of dark, blotchy sunspots, curving filaments, and lighter patches known as ‘plages’ – brighter regions often found near sunspots. The width of the image would cover roughly a third of the diameter of the solar disc.


----------



## Drone (Aug 7, 2019)

Download full-size original tif (641 MB)


----------



## lexluthermiester (Aug 7, 2019)

Here's a good one! Not so much pictures, but space related;


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## dont whant to set it"' (Aug 7, 2019)

@lexluthermiester I knew it there was something else


----------



## Drone (Aug 10, 2019)




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## Drone (Sep 11, 2019)

Low Surface Brightness galaxy UGC 695 has a high fraction of dark matter relative to the number of stars it contains.


----------



## Drone (Sep 13, 2019)

VISTA unveils a new image of the Large Magellanic Cloud

Fullsize original tif image (warning: 1.6 GB in size!)

Download


----------



## Drone (Sep 26, 2019)

Fast radio bursts strike again!










ISS timelapses





































Tethys appears to be stuck to Saturn's A and F rings






In this image, a galaxy called ESO 243-49 is home to an extremely bright object called HLX-1. Circled in this image, HLX-1 is the most likely example of a black hole in the intermediate mass range.


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## Drone (Oct 5, 2019)

Cosmic Jellyfish: a number of knotty streams of gas spewing outwards from a spiral galaxy named ESO 137-001.






NGC 4194, the Medusa merger






This cloud of gas and dust is full of bubbles, which are inflated by wind and radiation from massive young stars. Yellow circles and ovals show the locations of more than 30 bubbles. Squares indicate bow shocks, red arcs of warm dust formed as winds from fast-moving stars push aside dust grains.

This active region of star formation is located within the Milky Way, in the constellation Aquila. Black veins running throughout the cloud are regions of especially dense cold dust and gas where even more new stars are likely to form.


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## Drone (Oct 11, 2019)

The center of our Milky Way galaxy is hidden from the prying eyes of optical telescopes by clouds of obscuring dust and gas. But in this stunning vista, the Spitzer Space Telescope's infrared cameras penetrate much of the dust, revealing the stars of the crowded galactic center region. The upcoming James Webb Space Telescope will offer a much-improved infrared view, teasing out fainter stars and sharper details.






Perspective view of Nirgal Vallis (Mars)






Comet C/2016 R2 (PANSTARRS)






Jupiter


----------



## Drone (Oct 18, 2019)

Galaxy NGC 4380






Foreground asteroid passing the Crab Nebula


----------



## Drone (Oct 28, 2019)

NGC 1706 is a spiral galaxy, ~ 230 million ly away, in the constellation of Dorado.






NGC 1404 — a giant elliptical galaxy located 62 million ly away in the constellation of Fornax.
The galaxy’s reserves of hot gas are being forcibly ripped and stripped away, in time, NGC 1404 will lose most of its hot gas, and therefore its ability to form new stars.















Chandra Spots a Mega-Cluster of Galaxies in the Making


----------



## Drone (Nov 4, 2019)

Barnard's Merope Nebula, aka IC 349, is a cloud of interstellar gas and dust travelling through the Pleiades star cluster at a relative speed of 11 km/s.






Latest NASA Chandra and Spitzer goodness:











NASA's Juno spacecraft captures colorful, intricate patterns in a jet stream region of Jupiter's northern hemisphere known as "Jet N3."


----------



## Drone (Nov 16, 2019)




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## Drone (Nov 19, 2019)

ESO’s astronomical facilities in Chile






NGC 3749 lies > 135 million ly away, and is moderately luminous galaxy.






Spiral galaxy NGC 772


----------



## lexluthermiester (Nov 19, 2019)

Drone said:


>


This is an especially excellent photo!


----------



## Drone (Nov 22, 2019)

Orion A gas cloud in infrared






Deuteronilus Mensae (Mars)


----------



## Drone (Dec 3, 2019)

Just after its close flyby of Jupiter on Nov. 3, 2019, NASA's Juno spacecraft caught this striking view of Jupiter's southern hemisphere as the spacecraft sped away from the giant planet. This image captures massive cyclones near Jupiter's south pole, as well as the chaotic clouds of the folded filamentary region — the turbulent area between the orange band and the brownish polar region.










































Seen here, the majestic Milky Way rises above ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile, its bright band punctuated by red regions of star formation and dark, weaving filaments of interstellar dust. Two of the site’s telescopes, the 1-m Schmidt telescope (left) and the MPG-ESO 2.2-m telescope (right), are visible as well.


----------



## Drone (Dec 9, 2019)

This cloud-strewn new image of RCW 36 (or Gum 20) was captured by ESO’s Focal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph (FORS).







And now two Hubble images:

Within the tempestuous Carina Nebula lies “Mystic Mountain.”








We see NGC 5468 face on, meaning we can see the galaxy’s loose, open spiral pattern in beautiful detail in images such as this one from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.


----------



## Drone (Dec 14, 2019)

Comet 2I/Borisov is only the second interstellar object known to have passed through the solar system. These two images, taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, capture the comet appearing near a background galaxy (left) and soon after its closest approach to the Sun (right).






Galaxy NGC 3175 is located ~ 50 million ly away in the constellation of Antlia.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Dec 14, 2019)

That video report about the recently discovered black hole was laughable. They got so many facts wrong. I don't really blame them too much, they're reporters and news anchors, and black holes are a very misunderstood astronomical subject..


----------



## dont whant to set it"' (Dec 14, 2019)

Surface of a neutron star you say ?
Actual raytracing and not the other mumbo jumbo .


----------



## Drone (Dec 16, 2019)

ESO Telescope Images Stunning Central Region of Milky Way, Finds Ancient Star Burst


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## Drone (Dec 19, 2019)




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## dont whant to set it"' (Dec 26, 2019)

Betelgeuse "anomalies" and" fingers crossed?" It be a spectacular sight to witness but not at our expence ,I hope.


			https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.5407038


----------



## Drone (Dec 27, 2019)

A new, smaller cyclone can be seen at the lower right of this infrared image of Jupiter's south pole taken on Nov. 4, 2019, during the 23rd science pass of the planet by NASA's Juno spacecraft.





This composite visible-light image taken by the JunoCam imager aboard NASA's Juno spacecraft on Nov. 3, 2019, shows a new cyclone at Jupiter's south pole has joined five other cyclones to create a hexagonal shape around a large single cyclone.




Enhanced color photos of Jupiter


















This swirling mass of celestial gas, dust and stars is a moderately luminous spiral galaxy named ESO 021-G004, located just under 130 million light-years away.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jan 1, 2020)

dont whant to set it"' said:


> Betelgeuse "anomalies" and" fingers crossed?" It be a spectacular sight to witness but not at our expence ,I hope.
> 
> 
> https://www.cbc.ca/amp/1.5407038


While it is possible for that star to go supernova(it's theorized to be due for such at any time), it's more likely to just be in a fluctuation cycle. Would be awesome to see it go off though!


----------



## dorsetknob (Jan 1, 2020)

lexluthermiester said:


> While it is possible for that star to go supernova(it's theorized to be due for such at any time), it's more likely to just be in a fluctuation cycle. Would be awesome to see it go off though!


Its between 450 and 600ly  away  and probably as a Red giant it will expand a bit more before it collapse's to turn into a Super nova
That Collapse when it happens will only take Days at most (Speculation of course).
Betelgeuse has a known recorded History of dimming and brightning and this is just probably part of its cycle
Time to worry is when it gets Significantly brighter due to Pre Nova expansion and following colapse.

PS this may allready happened


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jan 1, 2020)

dorsetknob said:


> Betelgeuse has a known recorded History of dimming and brightning and this is just probably part of its cycle


What making this dimming cycle remarkable and getting people excited is that it's never gone this dim since we started recording observations. Of course this can not be considered conclusive as we've not been observing it for very long. So this dimming cycle might be remarkable to us, but can be a part of a longer cycle set that cycles over a time frame of hundreds or even thousands of years.



dorsetknob said:


> PS this may allready happened


True.


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## Drone (Jan 2, 2020)

M106 (aka NGC 4258), a spiral galaxy ~ 23 million ly away has two extra spiral arms that glow in X-ray, optical and radio light. These features, or anomalous arms, are not aligned with the plane of the galaxy, but instead intersect with it.




Caldwell 33 and 34 - the large image was taken by a ground-based telescope, while the three insets are Hubble close-up views.




Galaxy NGC 3175, with its mix of bright patches of glowing gas, dark lanes of dust, bright core, and whirling, pinwheeling arms coming together, is located ~ 50 million ly away in the constellation of Antlia.




 Spiral galaxy IC 2051, with its whirling, pinwheeling arms, and a bar of stars slicing through its center, lies ~ 85 million ly away in the in the southern constellation of Mensa.


----------



## Drone (Jan 6, 2020)

This smattering of celestial sequins is a spiral galaxy named NGC 4455, located in the northern constellation of Coma Berenices. The galaxy is ~ 45 million ly away.





This Hubble Space Telescope photograph showcases the majestic spiral galaxy UGC 2885, located 232 million ly away in the northern constellation Perseus. The galaxy is 2.5 times wider than our Milky Way and contains 10 times as many stars. A number of foreground stars in our Milky Way can be seen in the image, identified by their diffraction spikes. The brightest star photobombs the galaxy's disk. The galaxy has been nicknamed "Rubin's galaxy," after astronomer Vera Rubin (1928 – 2016), who studied the galaxy's rotation rate in search of dark matter.





A galaxy named NGC 2770


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## Drone (Jan 13, 2020)

Located ~ 100 million ly away in the constellation of Pisces, a shell elliptical galaxy to the upper-left of this image is named NGC 474. 
It is possible that the spiral galaxy to the lower-right, NGC 470, has been tugging on its larger friend for billions of years, causing density waves to reshape its structure.





A waxing crescent Moon is pictured as ISS orbited above Algeria.





Once used as the otherworldly lair for a James Bond villain, the ESO Residencia usually serves a far less sinister purpose!





This bright, somewhat blob-like object is a galaxy named NGC 1803. It is ~ 200 million ly away, in the southern constellation of Pictor.


----------



## Drone (Jan 14, 2020)

The Canadarm2 robotic arm with the Dextre robotic hand attached seemingly protrudes from the side of the ISS as the orbiting complex soared above the South Pacific Ocean.


----------



## Drone (Jan 20, 2020)

A multitude of swirling clouds in Jupiter's dynamic North Temperate Belt is captured in this image from NASA's Juno spacecraft. Appearing in the scene are several bright-white “pop-up” clouds as well as an anticyclonic storm, known as a white oval.






Barred spiral galaxy NGC 1022






Gum 26 is located ~ 20000 ly away in the southern constellation of Vela. It is something known as an HII region or  emission nebula, where the intense ultraviolet radiation streaming from newly-formed stars ionizes the surrounding hydrogen gas, causing it to emit a faint pinkish glow. By catching new stars “pink-handed” in this manner, astronomers can learn more about the conditions under which stars arise, and study how they influence their cosmic environment.


----------



## Ahhzz (Jan 20, 2020)

Drone said:


> ***Tons of Good Data and pics!!!***


I went looking, because I'm an uneducated fool, and discovered that scientists believe approximately half of the spiral galaxies in the universe rotate clockwise, and half counter-clockwise, which was neat; however, the really cool thing is that while almost all spirals rotate with their arms trailing, interactions with other galaxies can actually cause a very few to rotate with their spirals _leading_ the rotation


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## Drone (Jan 20, 2020)

@Ahhzz  Usually Universe doesn't care about right/left handedness (aka cosmological principle). 
(Observable) Universe is homogeneous and isotropic on the (sufficiently) large scale. More interestingly, Roger Penrose is looking for concentric rings in the cosmic microwave background 
He hopes to find them, so he can prove that there's no beginning and there's no end, just cyclical aeons. This sounds mathematically/geometrically intuitive. 
Leonard Susskind is working on holographic principle. But I digress I dunno lol so many interesting ideas, we're sitting and thinking on this third planet from the sun


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jan 20, 2020)

Drone said:


> This sounds mathematically/geometrically intuitive.


Unfortunately that effort will never succeed. The observations made over the year overwhelmingly show the universe expanding out from a central point in all directions. If we were to put time in reverse, everything would contract into a single point, thus effectively confirming the existence of the "big bang".


----------



## Drone (Jan 29, 2020)

Barred spiral galaxy NGC 7541 located ~ 110 million ly away





A mega-structure assembled in a system called Abell 1758, located ~ 3 billion light-years from Earth. It contains two pairs of colliding galaxy clusters that are heading toward one another.






This image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the Tarantula Nebula in two wavelengths of infrared light. The red regions indicate the presence of particularly hot gas, while the blue regions are interstellar dust that is similar in composition to ash from coal or wood-burning fires on Earth.





Paranal Observatory in northern Chile


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## Drone (Feb 14, 2020)

Spiral galaxy NGC 2008 located about 425 million ly from Earth in the constellation of Pictor.






This image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the Tarantula Nebula in three wavelengths of infrared light, each represented by a different color.
The green color in this image shows the presence of particularly hot gas emitting infrared light at a wavelength of 4.5 micrometers. The stars in the image are mostly a combination of green and blue. White hues indicate regions that radiate in all three wavelengths.


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## Drone (Feb 21, 2020)

Jupiter's Equator






Thick white clouds are present in this JunoCam image of Jupiter's equatorial zone. These clouds complicate the interpretation of infrared measurements of water. At microwave frequencies, the same clouds are transparent, allowing Juno's Microwave Radiometer to measure water deep into Jupiter's atmosphere.


----------



## Drone (Feb 26, 2020)




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## Drone (Mar 4, 2020)

This view of Jupiter’s atmosphere from NASA’s Juno spacecraft includes something remarkable: two storms caught in the act of merging.





This image was taken by Left Navigation Camera onboard NASA's Mars rover Curiosity on Sol 2664.

NASA's Curiosity rover has captured its highest-resolution panorama yet of the Martian surface. Composed of >1000 images taken during the 2019 Thanksgiving holiday and carefully assembled over the ensuing months, the composite contains 1.8 billion pixels of Martian landscape.

Download 2.43 GB version


----------



## Drone (Mar 11, 2020)

ESO telescopes






Jupiter’s Corona






North polar layered deposits on Mars






Infrared image of Cigar galaxy


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## Drone (Mar 17, 2020)

Jupiter















The Milky Way above the ELT site






NGC 4237 spiral galaxy


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## Drone (Mar 18, 2020)

new hot videos


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## Drone (Mar 23, 2020)

Single Arm Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 4618






The central region of our galaxy contains an exotic collection of objects, including a supermassive black hole weighing ~ 4 million times the mass of the Sun (called Sagittarius A*), clouds of gas at temperatures of millions of degrees, neutron stars and white dwarf stars tearing material from companion stars and beautiful tendrils of radio emission.


----------



## Drone (Apr 1, 2020)

This Picture of the Week captures the Milky Way streaking across the skies above the Chilean Atacama Desert.






Spiral galaxy NGC 4651


----------



## Drone (Apr 6, 2020)

Galaxy *NGC 2273*






Appearing as strings of orange dots, the brightest sets of dots belong to asteroids *Klotho & Lina*. Both orbit out in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, while smaller, more distant asteroids can also be seen passing through the image.






In this Hubble Space Telescope infrared image, researchers revisited one of Hubble's most iconic and popular images: the Eagle Nebula’s *Pillars of Creation*.






This 2010 image from the Herschel Space Observatory shows dust clouds associated with the Rosette Nebula, a stellar nursery ~ 5k ly from Earth in the Monoceros constellation. Herschel collected the infrared light given out by dust. The bright smudges are dusty cocoons containing massive embryonic stars, which will grow up to 10 times the mass of our Sun. The small spots near the center of the image are lower mass stellar embryos. The nebula itself is located to the right of the picture, along with its massive cluster of stars.















NASA’s Juno mission captured this look at Jupiter’s tumultuous northern regions during the spacecraft’s close approach to the planet on Feb. 17, 2020.


----------



## dorsetknob (Apr 13, 2020)

BepiColombo, the first European-Japanese spacecraft to hopefully orbit Mercury, has swung by Earth for its first gravitational assist maneuver in its seven-year journey to the innermost planet of our Solar System.


----------



## Drone (Apr 14, 2020)

Spiral Galaxy NGC 2906






Soyuz MS-16 lifts off from Site 31 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Thursday, April 9, 2020















> 100000 times the mass of the Sun, the *Brick* doesn’t seem to be forming any massive stars—yet. But based on its immense mass in such a small area, if it does form stars—as scientists think it should—it would be one of the most massive star clusters in the Milky Way galaxy.


----------



## Drone (Apr 20, 2020)

This classic photograph of the Earth was taken on Dec. 7, 1972, by the crew of Apollo 17.






Shooting Star over ESO Telescopes






Dwarf elliptical galaxy PGC 29388


----------



## Drone (Apr 23, 2020)




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## Drone (Apr 28, 2020)

Milky Way stretching over the Very Large Telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory, demonstrating the astounding level of detail visible in the night sky from this remote site in the Chilean Atacama Desert.






Known as NGC 4100, the galaxy boasts a neat spiral structure and swirling arms speckled with the bright blue hue of newly formed stars.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Apr 28, 2020)

Drone said:


>


Short answer; No.


----------



## dorsetknob (Apr 30, 2020)

Nasa images reveal Comet Atlas shattering into pieces - CBBC Newsround
					

Latest images from the Hubble Telescope prove that Comet Atlas has broken up but they also show that it is putting on a light display as it crumbles.




					www.bbc.co.uk
				




Exciting new images of Comet Atlas as it flies towards Earth have been released by Nasa and the European Space Agency.
Astronomers had thought it could be one of the brightest comets to fly past Earth in years.
However, the comet has been getting dimmer recently leading to concerns that it was actually breaking up into pieces.
Now, these latest images by the Hubble Space Telescope prove that the object has broken up but they also show that it is putting on a light display as it crumbles.
"This is really exciting — both because such events are super cool to watch and because they do not happen very often," said Quanzhi Ye from the University of Maryland, who is one of those responsible for the new images.
"Most comets that fragment (break up) are too dim to see. Events at such scale only happen once or twice a decade."
The break up of comets are hard to predict, and usually happen very quickly, making it hard for astronomers to know what causes it.
Comet Atlas will keep flying through space and will get as near as 115 million kilometres to Earth around late May, before shooting off towards the Sun.


----------



## Drone (May 4, 2020)

A spectacle over La Silla






Asteroid 2020 HS7 observed by the Tautenburg Observatory on 28 April 2020






A barred spiral galaxy called NGC 3583


----------



## Drone (May 6, 2020)

This 2018 composite of the Crab Nebula was made with data from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory (blue and white), Hubble Space Telescope (purple), and Spitzer Space Telescope (pink). The star that exploded to create the Crab Nebula was first seen from Earth in 1054 A.D.


----------



## Drone (May 11, 2020)

~ 85 million ly from Earth, in the constellation of Libra, is the beautiful intermediate spiral galaxy NGC 5861, captured here by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.


----------



## lexluthermiester (May 12, 2020)

Drone said:


>


Jupiter in IR EMR. Oh yeah!


----------



## Drone (May 13, 2020)

Astronomers finally detect the harmonic heartbeat of wayward musical stars
					

The discovery of hypnotic rhythms pulsating from an enigmatic group of delta Scuti stars is music to astronomers.




					www.abc.net.au


----------



## Drone (May 20, 2020)

Dwarf irregular galaxy ESO 461-036






Pair of interacting galaxies known as Arp 271





























The crew of the ISS snapped this image of a typhoon in the South Pacific Ocean on May 13, 2020.


----------



## lexluthermiester (May 20, 2020)

Drone said:


> Pair of interacting galaxies known as Arp 271


This one is very cool!


----------



## Drone (May 20, 2020)

lexluthermiester said:


> This one is very cool!


True, a pair of interacting galaxies is amazing. Can't wait when Milky Way meets Andromeda!


----------



## lexluthermiester (May 20, 2020)

Drone said:


> True, a pair of interacting galaxies is amazing. Can't wait when Milky Way meets Andromeda!


We need to solve that pesky death problem so we can live long enough to see it. Either that or make a time-dilation machine to zap ourselves to the future. LOL!


----------



## Drone (May 26, 2020)

NGC 3895 is a barred spiral galaxy that was first spotted by William Herschel in 1790.






Jupiter




































						Extremely rare 'cosmic ring of fire' discovered in the early universe
					

Galaxies are burnin' things and sometimes they make a fiery ring.




					www.cnet.com


----------



## Drone (May 29, 2020)




----------



## Drone (Jun 1, 2020)

Scientists confirm there is ‘an Earth’ around our nearest star
					

The planet, called Proxima b, is approximately 4.2 light years away. If it has water and oxygen, it could potentially be home to alien life




					www.independent.co.uk
				














The Demo-2 mission is the first launch with astronauts of the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket to the station as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program.






Almost like snowflakes, the stars of the globular cluster NGC 6441 sparkle peacefully in the night sky, ~ 13k ly from the Milky Way’s galactic center. Like snowflakes, the exact number of stars in such a cluster is difficult to discern. It is estimated that together the stars weigh 1.6 million times the mass of the Sun, making NGC 6441 one of the most massive and luminous globular clusters in the Milky Way.


----------



## Drone (Jun 3, 2020)

Amateur astroboffins spot young brown dwarf playing with planet-forming hula hoop just 102 parsecs from Earth
					

Closest example yet of substellar object




					www.theregister.com
				




thanks @dorsetknob 









						Hubble Makes Surprising Find in the Early Universe
					






					hubblesite.org
				









This view of sample site Osprey on asteroid Bennu is a mosaic of images collected by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft on May 26.

Latest NASA/HUBBLE videos


----------



## Drone (Jun 16, 2020)

Seen here in incredible detail, thanks to Hubble Space Telescope, is the starburst galaxy formally known as PLCK G045.1+61.1. The galaxy, which appears as multiple reddish dots near the center of the image, is being gravitationally lensed by a cluster of closer galaxies, also seen in the image.






Earth and Venus from Mars (Curiosity)





__





						Four newborn exoplanets get cooked by their sun                                   | AIP
					

Webseite des Leibniz-Instituts für Astrophysik Potsdam, Forschung von der Untersuchung unserer Sonne bis zur Entwicklung des Kosmos mit Schwerpunkten in der Erforschung kosmischer Magnetfelder, in der extragalaktischen Astrophysik sowie der Entwicklung von Forschungstechnologien in den Bereichen...




					www.aip.de


----------



## Caring1 (Jun 17, 2020)

I'm genuinely curious why some spiral galaxies spin anti-clockwise, and others spin clockwise.
Any ideas on this?


----------



## ne6togadno (Jun 17, 2020)

you look at them from the wrong side.


----------



## Drone (Jun 17, 2020)

That's a good question here's the latest study by Lior Shamir, a K-State computational astronomer and computer scientist:

An analysis of > 200000 spiral galaxies has revealed that the early universe could have been spinning.

A spiral galaxy is a unique astronomical object because its visual appearance depends on the observer's perspective. For instance, a spiral galaxy that spins clockwise when observed from Earth, would seem to spin counterclockwise when the observer is located in the opposite side of the galaxy. If Universe has no particular structure — as previous astronomers have predicted — the number of galaxies that spin clockwise would be roughly equal to the number of galaxies that spin counterclockwise. Shamir used data from modern telescopes to show that this is not the case.

When comparing the number of galaxies with different spin directions, *the number of galaxies that spin clockwise is not equal to the number of galaxies that spin counterclockwise*. The difference is small, just over 2%, but with the high number of galaxies, there is a probability of less than 1 to 4 billion to have such asymmetry by chance, according to Shamir's research.


----------



## Drone (Jun 23, 2020)

Hubble near-infrared and near-ultra-violet photos of NGC 6302 & 7027






Astronomers have discovered evidence for thousands of stellar mass black holes (which typically weigh between 5 to 30 times the mass of our Sun) located near the center of our Milky Way.






The galaxy known as NGC 5907 [Knife Edge Galaxy] stretches wide across this image. The Knife Edge Galaxy is ~ 50 million ly from Earth, lying in the northern constellation of Draco.




































						Young Giant Planet Offers Clues to Formation of Exotic Worlds
					

Jupiter-size planets orbiting close to their stars have upended ideas about how giant planets form. Finding young members of this planet class could help answer key questions.




					www.nasa.gov
				












						A Cosmic Baby Is Discovered, and It's Brilliant
					

Born from an exploded star, the infant magnetar belongs to a family of extreme objects called neutron stars. Its discovery may lend insight into these strange phenomena.




					www.jpl.nasa.gov


----------



## Drone (Jun 27, 2020)

This composite image, made from 6 frames, shows ISS, with a crew of five on board, in silhouette as it transits the Sun at roughly five miles per second, Wednesday, June 24, 2020.


----------



## Drone (Jul 7, 2020)

Image of star cluster G286.21+0.17, caught in the act of formation. This is a multiwavelength mosaic of more than 750 ALMA radio images, and 9 Hubble infrared images. ALMA shows molecular clouds (purple) and Hubble shows stars and glowing dust (yellow and red).






Io transit






This image from NASA’s Juno spacecraft captures several storms in Jupiter’s southern hemisphere (Figure A). Some of these storms, including the Great Red Spot at upper left, have been churning in the planet’s atmosphere for many years, but when Juno obtained this view of Jupiter, the smaller, oval-shaped feature at the center of the image was brand new.






The new feature was discovered by amateur astronomer Clyde Foster of Centurion, South Africa. The feature is a plume of cloud material erupting above the upper cloud layers of the Jovian atmosphere. These powerful convective "outbreaks" occasionally erupt in this latitude band, known as the South Temperate Belt (JunoCam observed another outbreak at this latitude back on Feb. 7, 2018).
















_After more than a year in a clay-rich region, NASA's Curiosity Mars rover is making a mile-long journey around some deep sand so that it can explore higher up Mount Sharp.









_


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jul 7, 2020)

Drone said:


>


That literally looks like a piece of digital art.


----------



## Drone (Jul 7, 2020)

lexluthermiester said:


> That literally looks like a piece of digital art.


 Power of radio and infrared.


----------



## Drone (Jul 12, 2020)

Captured by the Hubble Space Telescope, this image shows NGC 7513, a barred spiral galaxy. Located ~ 60 million ly away, NGC 7513 lies within the Sculptor constellation in the Southern Hemisphere.


----------



## Drone (Jul 15, 2020)

Hubble Sees a Star Called HBC 672 and the Bat Shadow






Free-floating Evaporating Gaseous Globule J025027.7+600849 located in the constellation of Cassiopeia.






Processed data from the WISPR instrument on NASA’s Parker Solar Probe shows greater detail in the twin tails of comet NEOWISE, as seen on July 5, 2020.


----------



## Drone (Jul 22, 2020)

Sunset over Atacama






Galaxy NGC 4848


----------



## Drone (Jul 30, 2020)

https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/press-releases/alma-finds-possible-sign-of-neutron-star-in-supernova-1987a/
		







Star cluster NGC 2203






(Sub)millimetre Stargazers (ALMA)






This patch of sky is found in the constellation of Crux (The Southern Cross), an extremely bright section of the Milky Way


----------



## Drone (Aug 4, 2020)

Latest news:









						Machine Learning Finds a Surprising Early Galaxy—Breaking the Lowest Oxygen Abundance Record
					

New results achieved by combining big data captured by the Subaru Telescope and the power of machine learning have discovered a galaxy with an extremely low oxygen abundance of 1.6% solar abundance, breaking the previous record of the lowest oxygen abundance.




					www.nao.ac.jp
				












						Radio telescope discovers exoplanet
					

To date, astronomers have found more than 4,300 planets orbiting stars other than the Sun. Almost all of them were discovered in visible light. Now researchers, with the help of a giant radio telescope, have tracked down an exoplanet. The celestial body, which is 35 light-years from Earth...




					www.mpg.de


----------



## Drone (Aug 7, 2020)

The barred spiral galaxy known as NGC 4907 shows its starry face from 270 million ly away. Shining brightly below the galaxy is a star that is actually within our own Milky Way galaxy. This star appears much brighter than the billions of stars in NGC 4907 as it's 100000 times closer, residing only 2500 ly away.






This long-exposure photograph captures a starry sky above the Earth's atmospheric glow as the ISS orbited above the Indian Ocean about halfway between South Africa and Australia.
















Vast areas of the Martian night sky pulse in ultraviolet light, according to images from NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft. The results are being used to illuminate complex circulation patterns in the Martian atmosphere.









						Stellar Egg Hunt with ALMA—Tracing Evolution from Embryo to Baby Star
					

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) took a census of stellar eggs in the constellation Taurus and revealed their evolution state.




					www.nao.ac.jp
				













Old but still relevant vid


----------



## Drone (Aug 14, 2020)

One of the coolest things I've ever seen! *Squeezars*










Other news:


----------



## Drone (Aug 25, 2020)

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope actually depicts a small section of the Cygnus supernova blast wave, located around 2400 ly away.







This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope features the spectacular galaxy NGC 2442, nicknamed the Meathook galaxy owing to its extremely asymmetrical and irregular shape.


----------



## Drone (Aug 28, 2020)

This illustration shows the location of the 43 quasars scientists used to probe Andromeda’s gaseous halo.






This image is of the Cepheus C and Cepheus B regions and combines data from Spitzer's IRAC and MIPS instruments.


----------



## Drone (Sep 4, 2020)

This image shows the Twin Peaks, which are modest-size hills to the southwest of the Mars Pathfinder landing site.


----------



## Drone (Sep 10, 2020)




----------



## Drone (Sep 15, 2020)

Many colorful stars are packed close together in this image of the globular cluster NGC 1805, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This tight grouping of thousands of stars is located near the edge of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our own Milky Way. The stars orbit closely to one another, like bees swarming around a hive. In the dense center of one of these clusters, stars are 100 to 1000 times closer together than the nearest stars are to our Sun, making planetary systems around them unlikely.


----------



## Drone (Sep 17, 2020)

Galaxy NGC 2835


----------



## Drone (Sep 22, 2020)

In these detailed infrared images of Saturn's icy moon Enceladus, reddish areas indicate fresh ice that has been deposited on the surface.






This latest image of Jupiter, taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope on Aug. 25, 2020.






Jupiter's volcanically active moon Io casts its shadow on the planet in this dramatic image from NASA's Juno spacecraft. As with solar eclipses on the Earth, within the dark circle racing across Jupiter's cloud tops one would witness a full solar eclipse as Io passes in front of the Sun.


----------



## Bubster (Sep 22, 2020)

Cosmic Beauty


----------



## Drone (Sep 24, 2020)

Cyclones at the north pole of *Jupiter* appear as swirls of striking colors in this *extreme false color* rendering of an image from NASA’s Juno mission.






This image is of galaxy cluster *Abell 2744*.






ESO's VLT






Stellar winds around star called R Aquilae


----------



## Drone (Sep 26, 2020)




----------



## Drone (Sep 29, 2020)

*Scientists precisely measure total amount of matter in the Universe*






*Matter makes up 31.5±1.3%* of the total amount of matter and energy in the Universe, with the remainder consisting of dark energy. 

“To put that amount of matter in context, if all the matter in the Universe were spread out evenly across space, it would correspond to an average mass density equal to only about six hydrogen atoms per cubic meter,” said first author Mohamed Abdullah, a graduate student in the UCR Department of Physics and Astronomy. “However, since we know 80% of matter is actually dark matter, in reality, most of this matter consists not of hydrogen atoms but rather of a type of matter which cosmologists don’t yet understand.”

Source


----------



## Drone (Oct 11, 2020)

Another universe existed before ours – and energy from it is coming out of black holes, says Nobel Prize winner
					

Sir Roger Penrose also claims that another universe will exist after this one




					www.independent.co.uk
				









This stunning image by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope features the spiral galaxy NGC 5643 in the constellation of Lupus (the Wolf).






Iris Nebula or NGC 7023 is a reflection nebula. Located some 1400 ly away from Earth, the Iris Nebula’s glowing gaseous petals stretch roughly 6 ly across.


----------



## Drone (Oct 15, 2020)

Years after we detected two neutron stars crashing into each other, we're still picking up X-rays. We don't know why
					

'Discovering a new type of celestial source is very exciting' lead astroboffin tells us




					www.theregister.com
				












						Pack your bags! Astroboffins spot 24 'superhabitable' exoplanets better than Earth at supporting complex life
					

Just a short 100 or more light years away




					www.theregister.com
				












						Supermassive black hole turns unlucky star into spaghetti
					

Pasta la vista, baby




					www.theregister.com
				










Free-floating Evaporating Gaseous Globule J025157.5+600606






Officially known as IC 63, this nebula is located 550 ly away in the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen.






Just below the surface, about 1/3 of Mars is covered in ice.


----------



## Drone (Oct 19, 2020)

New theory on the origin of Dark Matter
					

A recent study from the University of Melbourne proposes a new theory for the origin of dark matter, helping experimentalists in Australia and abroad in the search for the mysterious new matter.




					about.unimelb.edu.au
				












						The puzzle of the strange galaxy made of 99.99% dark matter is solved
					

At present, the formation of galaxies is difficult to understand without the presence of a ubiquitous, but mysterious component, termed dark matter. Astronomers have measure how much dark matter there is around galaxies, and have found that it varies between 10 and 300 times the quantity of...




					www.iac.es
				












						Astronomers say Milky Way has a clumpy halo
					

They suggest this heated halo was the incubator for our galaxy’s formation some 10 billion years ago.




					uk.finance.yahoo.com
				









Hanging above the pair of telescopes is the constellation of Orion, identifiable by his distinctive star-studded belt.






In this spectacular image captured by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the galaxy NGC 2799 (on the left) is seemingly being pulled into the center of the galaxy NGC 2798 (on the right).


----------



## lexluthermiester (Oct 27, 2020)

This is not an image per se, but it is a great series of them;


----------



## Drone (Oct 30, 2020)

Impact Craters Reveal Details of Titan's Dynamic Surface Weathering
					

New research on nine craters of Saturn's largest moon provides more details about how weathering affects the evolution of the surface – and what lies beneath.




					www.nasa.gov
				












						Hubble Finds ‘Greater Pumpkin’ Galaxy Pair
					

Hubble's holiday offering is a pair of colliding galaxies that resemble the cartoon Peanuts character Linus's imagining of the elusive Great Pumpkin.




					www.nasa.gov
				














NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope’s snapshot of NGC 34 galaxy.






ESO’s New Technology Telescope (NTT) has captured the familiar sight of three of our planetary neighbors as limited science operations restart at La Silla Observatory, located in the Chilean Atacama desert.






This image is a blend of 171 and 193 angstrom light as captured by the Solar Dynamics Observatory.


----------



## Drone (Nov 16, 2020)

Galaxy UGCA 193






Galaxy UGC 12588






Image of the galaxy LRG-3-817 is distorted by the effects of gravitational lensing.


----------



## Vayra86 (Nov 17, 2020)

Drone said:


> This image is a blend of 171 and 193 angstrom light as captured by the Solar Dynamics Observatory.



Devil's Night? Sun's def. got a Halloween grin on his face


----------



## Drone (Nov 19, 2020)

Perspective view of chaotic terrain in Mars' Pyrrhae Regio






Blue Ring Nebula






To the right of this image captured in northern Chile, the eye-catching arc of the Milky Way soars above the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA).


----------



## Drone (Nov 25, 2020)

Galaxy IC 5063 
distance: 156 million ly from Earth





The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich spacecraft lifts off from Space Launch Complex 4 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, Nov. 21, 2020, at 12:17 p.m. EST.


----------



## Ahhzz (Nov 25, 2020)

Am I reading this right? Do we believe we've got a 9th planet ice giant way way out?








						Born eccentric: Constraints on Jupiter and Saturn’s pre-instability orbits
					

An episode of dynamical instability is thought to have sculpted the orbital structure of the outer solar system. When modeling this instability, a key…




					www.sciencedirect.com
				











						Where were Jupiter and Saturn born?
					

New findings refine our understanding of the forces that determined our Solar System’s unusual architecture.




					carnegiescience.edu


----------



## dorsetknob (Nov 25, 2020)

Ahhzz said:


> Do we believe we've got a 9th planet ice giant way way out?


I'm Old School and as far as i am concerned

" After Pluto was discovered in 1930 it was declared to be the ninth planet from the Sun. "


----------



## Ahhzz (Nov 25, 2020)

dorsetknob said:


> I'm Old School and as far as i am concerned
> 
> " After Pluto was discovered in 1930 it was declared to be the ninth planet from the Sun. "


I won't disagree with you  Maybe I should have said "another planet" heheh


----------



## Drone (Nov 25, 2020)

@dorsetknob Pluto perfectly satisfies Titius–Bode law so it's kinda planet but so does Ceres. Therefore Ceres should be called planet too.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Nov 30, 2020)

While this is not an image, it is directly related to imagery. Very exciting potential!!


----------



## metalfiber (Dec 1, 2020)

The ninth planet has been referred to as Planet X for a long time...









						The race to find Planet X heats up
					

Teams of scientist are vying to find the hypothetical Planet X in the distant reaches of the solar system.




					www.axios.com
				












						The search for Planet X gets a boost with the discovery of a super distant object
					

The edge of our cosmic neighborhood is slowly coming into focus




					www.theverge.com
				




Edit: oop's, a little off topic.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Dec 1, 2020)

Drone said:


> @dorsetknob Pluto perfectly satisfies Titius–Bode law so it's kinda planet but so does Ceres. *Therefore Ceres should be called planet too.*


I'm cool with that. I've been suggesting exactly this for decades.


----------



## Drone (Dec 3, 2020)

HUBBLE CAPTURES UNPRECEDENTED FADING OF STINGRAY NEBULA











This large expanse of space captured with the Hubble Space Telescope features the galaxy SDSSJ225506.80+005839.9. 






Lying inside our home galaxy this object is a turbulent birthing ground for new stars in a region known as the Orion B molecular cloud complex, located 1350 ly away. 





ESO’s Paranal Observatory, Chile.


----------



## Drone (Dec 10, 2020)




----------



## Drone (Dec 18, 2020)

The Hubble Space Telescope captured a crowd of stars M107 (one of >150 globular star clusters found around the disc of the Milky Way).






This image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, depicts GAL-CLUS-022058s (largest and one of the most complete Einstein rings ever discovered in our Universe).






The Moon, left, Saturn, upper right, and Jupiter, lower right, are seen after sunset with the Washington Monument, Thurs. Dec. 17, 2020, in Washington.






The antennas comprising the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array appear to emit an eerie, vivid shade of green light.
The light emanates from indicator lights, which show whether or not it is safe for staff to approach the antennas. A green light as pictured indicates that it’s safe to approach.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Dec 18, 2020)

Drone said:


> (largest and one of the most complete Einstein rings ever discovered in our Universe)


Otherwise known as gravity lensing.


----------



## Drone (Dec 27, 2020)

This news image from the VLTI is 21000 times more zoomed in than the original image of the Toby Jug Nebula.






Lenticular galaxy NGC 1947






Thousands of sparkling young stars are nestled within the giant nebula NGC 3603, one of the most massive young star clusters in the Milky Way.
NGC 3603, a prominent star-forming region in the Carina spiral arm of the Milky Way ~ 20000 ly away, reveals stages in the life cycle of stars.


JAXA shows the sub-surface samples it collected from asteroid Ryugu | Engadget


----------



## Drone (Jan 8, 2021)




----------



## Drone (Jan 12, 2021)

Galaxy NGC 613






Galaxy NGC 6946


----------



## Drone (Jan 14, 2021)

NASA’s Curiosity Rover Reaches Its 3000th Day on Mars​




Jupiter





This image shows a new type of star that has never been seen before in X-ray light. This strange star formed after two white dwarfs – remnants of stars like our Sun – collided and merged. But instead of destroying each other in the event, the white dwarfs formed a new object that shines bright in X-ray light.




Galaxy cluster Abell 2261 located ~ 2.7 billion ly from Earth.





Inside star cluster NGC 602, a star-forming region in the Small Magellanic Cloud, bright, blue, newly formed stars are blowing a cavity in this nebula, sculpting the inner edge of its outer portions, slowly eroding it away and eating into the material beyond. The diffuse outer reaches of the nebula prevent the energetic outflows from streaming away from the cluster. Elephant trunk–like dust pillars point toward the hot blue stars and are telltale signs of their eroding effect. Star formation started at the center of the cluster and propagated outward, with the youngest stars still forming today along the dust ridges.


----------



## biffzinker (Jan 14, 2021)

Drone said:


> This image shows a new type of star that has never been seen before in X-ray light. This strange star formed after two white dwarfs – remnants of stars like our Sun – collided and merged. But instead of destroying each other in the event, the white dwarfs formed a new object that shines bright in X-ray light.


Where did you find this?


----------



## Drone (Jan 14, 2021)

^  Image was made by ESA’s XMM-Newton X-ray telescope.


----------



## biffzinker (Jan 14, 2021)

Drone said:


> ^  Image was made by ESA’s XMM-Newton X-ray telescope.


Was there a news article? I was curious if there was anymore said about it.

Nvm, I searched for it.


----------



## Drone (Jan 14, 2021)

It was on twitter with link to the image and they said that the research is ongoing. They also stated that the star is very unstable and will likely collapse into a neutron star within 10000 years.


----------



## ExcuseMeWtf (Jan 15, 2021)

>



Is it just me or was Sun really flaring up in December?


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jan 15, 2021)

ExcuseMeWtf said:


> Is it just me or was Sun really flaring up in December?


Not to any unusual degree. Why do you ask?


----------



## Drone (Jan 15, 2021)




----------



## biffzinker (Jan 16, 2021)

Thank you for sharing those videos. @Drone


----------



## ExcuseMeWtf (Jan 16, 2021)

lexluthermiester said:


> Not to any unusual degree. Why do you ask?



It seems higher than in past months of the year.

Because why not? Did this question offend you in some way?


----------



## the54thvoid (Jan 16, 2021)

He probably asked because, by inference from your post, you perhaps had evidence to illustrate the point. I.e, you'd noticed something during observation, or in the press. Likely a curiosity, to delve deeper. 

I doubt any offence was caused.


----------



## ExcuseMeWtf (Jan 16, 2021)

What kind of additional evidence would you expect? Wasn't it apparent on the video itself?

Actually perhaps not, as googling shows.





__





						StackPath
					





					www.spaceweatherlive.com
				




There were indeed more intense solar flares towards the end of the year, also in November.

Guess I missed those, or they were on not observed side of the Sun.

Hoped someone will take up the thread in constructive manner, but I guess it's just me doing so then.


----------



## Drone (Jan 16, 2021)

Captured with the MUSE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), this image of the distant spiral galaxy *NGC 1097* shows a textbook example of a star-bursting nuclear ring. Located 45 million ly away from Earth, in the constellation of Fornax, this ring lies at the very center of its galaxy. It spans only 5000 ly across, being dwarfed by the full size of its host galaxy, which extends some tens of thousands of ly beyond its center.


----------



## lexluthermiester (Jan 17, 2021)

ExcuseMeWtf said:


> It seems higher than in past months of the year.
> 
> Because why not? Did this question offend you in some way?


Not at all. Solar activity is not any different than in past trends observed. That's why I asked. Was thinking that perhaps you had seen something not commonly or publicly disclosed.


----------



## Drone (Jan 29, 2021)

Hubble takes portrait of the ‘Lost Galaxy’ NGC 4535 located in the constellation of Virgo, around 50 million ly from Earth.




The road to ESO’s La Silla Observatory in the Chilean Atacama Desert appears to curve around the mountain and collide with the downward slope of the Milky Way.




The Miñiques volcano complex near Chajnantor


----------



## Drone (Feb 8, 2021)

The tip of the "wing" of the Small Magellanic Cloud galaxy is dazzling in this 2013 view from NASA's Great Observatories. The Small Magellanic Cloud, or SMC, is a small galaxy ~ 200000 ly way that orbits our own Milky Way spiral galaxy.






ESO 455-10 - planetary nebula, located in the constellation of Scorpius. 






M1-63 - bipolar planetary nebula located in the constellation of Scutum.






Moon from ISS






NGC 6902 - spiral galaxy located > 130 million ly away in the constellation of Sagittarius. This image was taken with Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer instrument attached to one of the four 8.2-metre telescopes that make up the VLT, and shows the galaxy from a unique perspective. A zoom in towards the galaxy’s center, the image shows a nuclear ring where the orange glow of intense star formation is visible.


----------



## Drone (Feb 22, 2021)

Hubble Space Telescope picture of NGC 4826 — a spiral galaxy located 17 million light-years away in the constellation of Coma Berenices.






This view of Jupiter's turbulent atmosphere from NASA's Juno spacecraft includes several of the planet's southern jet streams.






SU Aur, a star much younger and more massive than the Sun, is surrounded by a giant planet-forming disc. This image, captured by the SPHERE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), shows the disc around SU Aur in unprecedented detail, including the long dust trails connected to it.

The star itself is obscured by the instrument’s coronagraph, a device that blocks the light from the central star to allow the less bright features around it to stand out.

The dust trails are composed of material from an encompassing nebula flowing into the disc. This nebula is likely the outcome of a collision between the star and a huge cloud of gas and dust, resulting in the unique shape of this planet-forming disc and the surrounding dust structure.


----------



## Drone (Feb 27, 2021)

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe captured stunning views of Venus during its close flyby of the planet in July 2020.






This 2003 composite X-ray (blue and green) and optical (red) image of the active galaxy, NGC 1068, shows gas blowing away in a high-speed wind from the vicinity of a central supermassive black hole. 
Regions of intense star formation in the inner spiral arms of the galaxy are highlighted by both optical and X-ray emission.


----------



## Drone (Mar 8, 2021)

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope picture of NGC4826 — a spiral galaxy located 17 million ly away in the constellation of Coma Berenices.






















































						Astronomers May Have Found The First Evidence For Tectonic Activity On An Exoplanet
					

"It's tectonics, but not as we know it." Computer simulations of the rocky exoplanet LHS 3844b show it may have a tectonic cycle and volcanism very unlike Earth.




					www.forbes.com


----------



## Drone (Mar 17, 2021)

Hubble views NGC 1947 - a galaxy with faint threads​















Located ~ 5k ly away in the constellation of Cygnus, Abell 78 is an unusual type of planetary nebula. 









						Astronomers find supermassive black hole on the move
					

Astronomers at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian have detected a moving supermassive black hole.




					news.harvard.edu
				




IMAGE RELEASE: Cosmic Lens Reveals Faint Radio Galaxy - National Radio Astronomy Observatory (nrao.edu)


----------



## Ahhzz (Mar 18, 2021)

Anyone seen this guy's project? 1250 hours of Galaxy exposures.... absolutely gorgeous....









						Photographer Spends 12 Years, 1250 Hours, Exposing Photo of Milky Way
					

Finnish astrophotographer J-P Metsavainio has released a Milky Way photo that took him nearly 12 years to create. The 1.7-gigapixel image has a cumulative




					petapixel.com


----------



## Drone (Mar 29, 2021)

Decades-Old NASA Data Reveals Midsize Black Hole | Quanta Magazine

The ‘Camel’ Supernova Reveals the Birth of a Black Hole | Quanta Magazine



























Hot bubble of hydrogen gas — named Sh 2-305






Filaments of ionized gas — named Veil Nebula


----------



## Drone (Apr 3, 2021)




----------



## ExcuseMeWtf (Apr 5, 2021)

New image of Apophis which up to this point was among the most likely to collide and cause some damage. Allowed us to calculate its path more accurately, and we're safe for at least next century.









						| EarthSky
					

Apophis' flyby in March 2021 enabled astronomers to conclude there's no chance this asteroid will strike Earth anytime soon. The next flyby will be in 2029.




					earthsky.org


----------



## Drone (Apr 8, 2021)

This view shows ESO’s Paranal Observatory, home to the behemoth Very Large Telescope.






This image was taken with the FORS2 instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope in late 2019, when comet 2I/Borisov passed near the Sun.

Since the comet was travelling at breakneck speed, ~ 175000 km/h, the background stars appeared as streaks of light as the telescope followed the comet’s trajectory. The colors in these streaks give the image some disco flair and are the result of combining observations in different wavelength bands, highlighted by the various colors in this composite image.






A sea of dark dunes, sculpted by the wind into long lines, surrounds Mars' northern polar cap and covers an area as big as Texas. In this false-color image, areas with cooler temperatures are recorded in bluer tints, while warmer features are depicted in yellows and oranges. Thus, the dark, sun-warmed dunes glow with a golden color. This image covers an area 30 km wide. 

This scene combines images taken during the period from December 2002 to November 2004 by the Thermal Emission Imaging System instrument on the Mars Odyssey orbiter. It is part of a special set of images marking the 20th anniversary of Odyssey, the longest-working Mars spacecraft in history. The pictured location on Mars is 80.3° north latitude, 172.1° east longitude.


----------



## Drone (Apr 14, 2021)

Milky Way Across the Desert


















































__





						News - Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics - The University of Manchester
					

Keep up to date with the latest news from the Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics at The University of Manchester, the home of University astronomy research.



					www.jodrellbank.manchester.ac.uk
				




X-ray image of the sky by Russian-German X-ray observatory Spektr-RG

ИКИ РАН. Путешествие по рентгеновскому небу с телескопом «Спектр-РГ» - Новости - Госкорпорация «Роскосмос» (roscosmos.ru)


----------



## Drone (Apr 16, 2021)

Curiosity's view of Mont Mercou






Spectacular jets are powered by the gravitational energy of a supermassive black hole in the core of the elliptical galaxy Hercules A. The jets shoot through space for millions of trillions of km.


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## Drone (Apr 21, 2021)

To celebrate the 21st anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope's deployment into space, astronomers at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md., pointed Hubble's eye at an especially photogenic pair of interacting galaxies called Arp 273.






In this image that astronaut Scott Kelly posted to Twitter on Aug. 9, 2015 during his #YearInSpace captures all the the places humans dwell – the Earth, the ISS and the Milky Way.






This panoramic selfie was taken on 9 April 2016 by ESO Photo Ambassador Petr Horálek.






This image shows a close-up portrait of the magnificent spiral galaxy NGC 4603, which lies > 100 million ly away in the constellation of Centaurus.


----------



## Drone (Apr 26, 2021)

The Necklace Nebula — which also goes by the less glamorous name of PN G054.2-03.4 — was produced by a pair of tightly orbiting Sun-like stars. Roughly 10000 years ago, one of the aging stars expanded and engulfed its smaller companion, creating something astronomers call a “common envelope”. The smaller star continued to orbit inside its larger companion, increasing the bloated giant’s rotation rate until large parts of it spun outwards into space. This escaping ring of debris formed the Necklace Nebula, with particularly dense clumps of gas forming the bright “diamonds” around the ring.






This work is based on NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory observations of the remains of a supernova called Cassiopeia A, located in our galaxy ~ 11k ly from Earth. 
This is one of the youngest known supernova remnants, with an age of about 350 years.
When the supernova happened, titanium fragments were produced deep inside the massive star. The fragments penetrated the surface of the massive star, forming the rim of the supernova remnant, Cas A. The amount of stable titanium produced in Cas A exceeds the total mass of the Earth.


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## Drone (May 6, 2021)

Pictured here is the region of the sky around the star AG Carinae, which is positioned in the center of the image.















This detailed image features Abell 3827, a galaxy cluster that offers a wealth of exciting possibilities for study. It was observed by Hubble in order to study dark matter, which is one of the greatest puzzles cosmologists face today.


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## Drone (May 11, 2021)

DG121 is a cloud of ionized hydrogen located in the constellation of Puppis. The brightest star in the DG121 region, seen near the center in this picture, is HD 60068.






The emission nebula NGC 2313. The bright star V565 — surrounded by four prominent diffraction spikes — illuminates a silvery, fan-shaped veil of gas and dust, while the right half of this image is obscured by a dense cloud of dust.


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## Drone (May 13, 2021)

For 2 years, OSIRIS-REx studied the asteroid Bennu, revealing the many secrets of this ancient body and delivering clues about its rubble-pile-like consistency and surface terrain, which turned out to be much rockier and more rugged than initially expected from the observations of ground-based telescope. On May 10, 2021, the spacecraft embarked on its return voyage to Earth. On Sept. 24, 2023, the spacecraft will jettison the sealed capsule containing the sample and send it onto a trajectory to touch down in the Utah desert.


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## Caring1 (May 13, 2021)

Drone said:


> On Sept. 24, 2023, the spacecraft will jettison the sealed capsule containing the sample and send it onto a trajectory to touch down in the Utah desert.


Finders keepers.


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## Drone (May 17, 2021)

This packed Hubble Picture showcases the galaxy cluster ACO S 295, as well as a jostling crowd of background galaxies and foreground stars. Galaxies of all shapes and sizes populate this image, ranging from stately spirals to fuzzy ellipticals.


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## lexluthermiester (May 18, 2021)

Drone said:


> This packed Hubble Picture showcases the galaxy cluster ACO S 295, as well as a jostling crowd of background galaxies and foreground stars. Galaxies of all shapes and sizes populate this image, ranging from stately spirals to fuzzy ellipticals.


This photo also illustrates dopler-shift very well. The galaxies that are very blue are actually blue-shifted as they are coming toward us. Other galaxies that are very red are red-shifted as they are moving away from us. Very interesting effect. Using the shift, which is a deviation from what would be considered a standard spectrum output, can help us measure how fast those galaxies are moving(relative to us) based on how blue or red shifted they are.


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## Drone (May 21, 2021)




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## Drone (May 26, 2021)

​Hubble’s Distant View of the Supernova Remnant 1E 0102.2-7219​





This image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 5037, which is found in the constellation of Virgo and was first documented by William Herschel in 1785. It lies ~ 150 million ly away from us, and yet it's possible to see the delicate structures of gas and dust within the galaxy in extraordinary detail.


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## Drone (May 28, 2021)




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## Drone (May 29, 2021)

The most detailed dark matter map of our universe is weirdly smooth | MIT Technology Review


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## Drone (Jun 4, 2021)

Failed galaxy UDG4






Spiral galaxy NGC 691


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## Drone (Jun 7, 2021)

This image, taken with Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), features the spiral galaxy NGC 4680. At 2 o’clock and 7 o’clock two other galaxies can be seen flanking NGC 4680.






Grand Design Spiral Galaxy named NGC 4254 (M99), a beautiful cosmic spectacle located in the constellation of Coma Berenices (Berenice’s Hair). 
Only ~ 10% of all spirals are of the grand design variety, making objects like M99 somewhat uncommon. The justification behind M99’s categorization is clear in this image; bright, swirling arms carve through the dark surrounding space, and are easily identifiable as a number of different, coherent structures.






Hubble Space Telescope image of Tycho crater on the Moon.


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## Drone (Jun 9, 2021)

Arp 299 is a system located ~ 140 million ly from Earth, containing two galaxies that are merging, which has created a partially blended mix of stars from each galaxy.




This image of the dark side of the Jovian moon Ganymede was obtained by the Stellar Reference Unit star camera aboard NASA's Juno spacecraft during its June 7, 2021, flyby of the icy moon.






At the time of closest approach, Juno was within 1038 km of its surface – closer to Jupiter's largest moon than any other spacecraft has come in more than two decades.






This GIF shows clouds drifting over Mount Sharp on Mars, as viewed by NASA's Curiosity rover on March 19, 2021, the 3063rd Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Each frame of the scene was stitched together from 6 individual images.


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## lexluthermiester (Jun 10, 2021)

Drone said:


> Arp 299 is a system located ~ 140 million ly from Earth, containing two galaxies that are merging, which has created a partially blended mix of stars from each galaxy.


For those interested, I found this to be such a cool photo I made a 2160p wallpaper out of it;

Enjoy!


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## Drone (Jun 10, 2021)

lexluthermiester said:


> For those interested, I found this to be such a cool photo I made a 2160p wallpaper out of it;
> 
> Enjoy!


It's so cool, looks like two mouths of a wormhole.


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## Drone (Jun 11, 2021)

​Earth's Atmospheric Glow and Star Trails​


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## Drone (Jun 15, 2021)

The dark skies above ESO’s Paranal Observatory, home to ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), yield breathtaking views so clear and so full of stars that you could almost touch them.






This image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 3254, observed using Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3). WFC3 has the capacity to observe ultraviolet, visible and near-infrared light, and this image is a composite of observations taken in the visible and infrared.
It's a Seyfert galaxy, meaning that it has an extraordinarily active core, known as an active galactic nucleus, which releases as much energy as the rest of the galaxy put together.


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## Drone (Jun 17, 2021)

Did We Just Find The Largest Rotating ‘Thing’ In The Universe?
					

Filaments, hundreds of millions of light-years long, were just caught spinning.




					www.forbes.com
				












						Study of Young Chaotic Star System Reveals Planet Formation Secrets - National Radio Astronomy Observatory
					

Scientists using ALMA to observe the young star Elias 2-27 have confirmed the key role of gravitational instability in planet formation.




					public.nrao.edu
				









						Mystery of Galaxy's Missing Dark Matter Deepens
					






					hubblesite.org


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## Drone (Jun 30, 2021)

In this June 2021 image, our Sun's glint beams off the Indian Ocean as the ISS orbited about 270 miles above the Earth near western Australia. The station orbits the Earth about every 90 minutes at a speed of > 17000 miles per hour.






This composite image made from seven frames shows the ISS, with a crew of seven onboard, in silhouette as it transits the Sun at roughly five miles per second, Friday, June 25, 2021, from near Nellysford, Va.






A cataclysmic cosmic collision takes center stage in this image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The image features the interacting galaxy pair IC 1623, which lies ~ 275 million ly away in the constellation Cetus. The two galaxies are in the final stages of merging, and astronomers expect a powerful inflow of gas to ignite a frenzied burst of star formation in the resulting compact starburst galaxy.






Open star cluster NGC 330, which lies ~ 180000 ly away inside the Small Magellanic Cloud in the constellation Tucana.


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## lexluthermiester (Jun 30, 2021)

Drone said:


> Open star cluster NGC 330, which lies ~ 180000 ly away inside the Small Magellanic Cloud in the constellation Tucana.


This is such a cool photo! Decided to make a 2160p(4k) wallpaper out of it. Enjoy!

EDIT: Just in case, I claim no ownership to the original photo or this rework of it into a wallpaper. 
NASA is the rights holder. Only made the wallpaper for fun under the terms of fair-use.


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## Drone (Jul 2, 2021)

This 2004 image was produced by combining a dozen observations from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory made of a 130 ly region in the center of the Milky Way. The colors represent low (red), medium (green) and high (blue) energy X-rays. Thanks to Chandra's unique resolving power, astronomers have now been able to identify thousands of point-like X-ray sources due to neutron stars, black holes, white dwarfs, foreground stars, and background galaxies. What remains is a diffuse X-ray glow extending from the upper left to the lower right, along the direction of the disk of the Galaxy. The spectrum of the diffuse glow is consistent with a hot gas cloud that contains two components – 10 million & 100 million °C  gas. The diffuse X-rays appear to be the brightest part of a ridge of X-ray emission that stretches for several thousand ly along the disk of the Galaxy. The extent of this ridge implies that the diffuse hot gas in this image is probably not being heated by the supermassive black hole Sgr A* at the center of the Milky Way.


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## Drone (Jul 19, 2021)

These images, from a program led by Julianne Dalcanton of the University of Washington in Seattle, demonstrate Hubble's return to full science operations.
ARP-MADORE2115-273 is a rarely observed example of a pair of interacting galaxies in the southern hemisphere.
ARP-MADORE0002-503 is a large spiral galaxy with unusual, extended spiral arms. While most disk galaxies have an even number of spiral arms, this one has three.​



On the horizon, a green object shines like a round, fuzzy blob; this is actually an interplanetary visitor called Comet 252P/LINEAR. This comet was pictured as it soared past the Earth in April 2016, skimming some 5.3 million km away from our planet. Although it was too faint to see with the unaided eye, it showed up beautifully in telescopic observations and images such as this one.​​




















​This dramatic image from January 2006 offers a peek inside a cavern of roiling dust and gas where thousands of stars are forming. The image, taken by the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard the Hubble Space Telescope, represents the sharpest view ever taken of this region until this time, called the Orion Nebula. >3000 stars of various sizes appear in this image. Some of them have never been seen in visible light.​



​The centre of this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is framed by the tell-tale arcs that result from strong gravitational lensing, a striking astronomical phenomenon which can warp, magnify, or even duplicate the appearance of distant galaxies.

Gravitational lensing occurs when light from a distant galaxy is subtly distorted by the gravitational pull of an intervening astronomical object. In this case, the relatively nearby galaxy cluster MACSJ0138.0-2155 has lensed a significantly more distant quiescent galaxy — a slumbering giant known as MRG-M0138 which has run out of the gas required to form new stars and is located 10 billion ly away. Astronomers can use gravitational lensing as a natural magnifying glass, allowing them to inspect objects like distant quiescent galaxies which would usually be too difficult for even Hubble to resolve.​​


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## Drone (Jul 22, 2021)

Ingenuity, the helicopter that arrived on the Red Planet on the Mars Perseverance rover, has made nine flights on Mars. Ingenuity's historic achievement is the first powered helicopter flight on a terrestrial body other than Earth. This image was captured by Mars Perseverance rover using its Left Mastcam-Z Camera, composed of a pair of cameras located high on the rover's mast, on Jun. 15, 2021 (Sol 114).






This wide view of Mars' Jezero Crater was taken by NASA's Perseverance rover on July 15, 2021 (the 143rd sol, or Martian day, of its mission).


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 22, 2021)

I found this and thought folks here might enjoy it;









EDIT:
Once couldn't resist making a wallpaper, this time of the Orion Nebula. Enjoy!

Click the thumbnail to get the full size image in 2160p.


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## Drone (Jul 23, 2021)

bonus: what a cool video!!


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## 64K (Jul 24, 2021)

There's some really big things out there in space:


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## delshay (Jul 24, 2021)

64K said:


> There's some really big things out there in space:



The biggest star is "Stephenson 2‑18".  That video is old.

Sun Compared to Stephenson 2-18: The New Largest Known Star, Bigger than UY Scuti • (2K) • 2021 - YouTube


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## 64K (Jul 24, 2021)

delshay said:


> The biggest star is "Stephenson 2‑18".  That video is old.
> 
> Sun Compared to Stephenson 2-18: The New Largest Known Star, Bigger than UY Scuti • (2K) • 2021 - YouTube



I just checked and the video I posted is 3 years old. I didn't know there was a more recent comparison from 8 months ago or I would have posted that one.


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## delshay (Jul 24, 2021)

64K said:


> I just checked and the video I posted is 3 years old. I didn't know there was a more recent comparison from 8 months ago or I would have posted that one.



No worries, just let me know how many earths we can fit inside & you are forgiven.


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 24, 2021)

delshay said:


> No worries, just let me know how many earths we can fit inside & you are forgiven.


Inside Stephenson2.18? I read somewhere an estimated 2.9billion.


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## Space Lynx (Jul 25, 2021)

@lexluthermiester @Drone 

how come we don't have good images of say the moon around Neptune?  Why can't the Hubble just point over that way and take a quick pic for us? or are its lenses only capable of seeing super far away?


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 25, 2021)

lynx29 said:


> @lexluthermiester @Drone
> 
> how come we don't have good images of say the moon around Neptune?  Why can't the Hubble just point over that way and take a quick pic for us? or are its lenses only capable of seeing super far away?


Very good question.


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## Candor (Jul 25, 2021)

Hubble has and does take images within our solar system as close as our moon.


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## Space Lynx (Jul 25, 2021)

nice... Jupiter doesn't get enough credit for saving our asses. lol  "vacuum cleaner"    

still nothing about neptunes moon, but that's fair enough, hubble has a ton on it's 'to do list' i imagine so anyway.


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## Candor (Jul 25, 2021)

This is one of the most detailed images of Neptune's moon Triton, taken by Voyager 2 in 1989.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Triton_moon_mosaic_Voyager_2_(large).jpg

Considering Neptune is nearly as far away as Pluto, this is the best Hubble could do there.
https://planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/web/assets/pictures/20180425_pluto-comparison-bordered.jpg


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## 64K (Jul 25, 2021)

I was just reading some facts about Hubble and it's truly impressive.









						About - Hubble Facts
					

NASA.gov brings you the latest images, videos and news from America's space agency. Get the latest updates on NASA missions, watch NASA TV live, and learn about our quest to reveal the unknown and benefit all humankind.




					www.nasa.gov


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## Space Lynx (Jul 25, 2021)

Candor said:


> This is one of the most detailed images of Neptune's moon Triton, taken by Voyager 2 in 1989.
> https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Triton_moon_mosaic_Voyager_2_(large).jpg
> 
> Considering Neptune is nearly as far away as Pluto, this is the best Hubble could do there.
> https://planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/web/assets/pictures/20180425_pluto-comparison-bordered.jpg



let's hope the JWST gives us better images than these. surely it will since tech has advanced so much.


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 26, 2021)

lynx29 said:


> let's hope the JWST gives us better images than these. surely it will since tech has advanced so much.


James Web Telescope is an intrared telescope. Not sure if it has visible spectrum abilities.


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## Space Lynx (Jul 26, 2021)

lexluthermiester said:


> James Web Telescope is an intrared telescope. Not sure if it has visible spectrum abilities.



RIP moon of Neptune, no one loves you but me


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## Drone (Jul 26, 2021)

lynx29 said:


> @lexluthermiester @Drone
> or are its lenses only capable of seeing super far away?


Yes. Seeing hyper shiny object far away is easier than seeing tiny dim object nearby. Suppose there's a light beacon far away and tiny fly right next to you. In pitch-dark you'll see the beacon but won't see the fly.


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## Space Lynx (Jul 26, 2021)

Drone said:


> Yes. Seeing hyper shiny object far away is easier than seeing tiny dim object nearby. Suppose there's a light beacon far away and tiny fly right next to you. In pitch-dark you'll see the beacon but won't see the fly.



I'm just surprised we haven't sent a small probe to take pictures of it in high resolution.  and transmit those images back.


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 26, 2021)

Drone said:


> Yes. Seeing hyper shiny object far away is easier than seeing tiny dim object nearby. Suppose there's a light beacon far away and tiny fly right next to you. In pitch-dark you'll see the beacon but won't see the fly.


That's an excellent analogy!


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## Drone (Jul 26, 2021)

lynx29 said:


> I'm just surprised we haven't sent a small probe to take pictures of it in high resolution.  and transmit those images back.


It was done by Voyager in 1989, the only spacecraft that got that far

Flight Over Triton | NASA Solar System Exploration


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## Space Lynx (Jul 26, 2021)

Drone said:


> It was done by Voyager in 1989, the only spacecraft that got that far
> 
> Flight Over Triton | NASA Solar System Exploration



I know that, but it is blurry as crap.


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## Drone (Jul 26, 2021)

HCG 86 - four galaxies located ~ 270 million ly from Earth in the Sagittarius constellation, are seen from Earth as arranged in triangular shape, with three of them on a straight line and one underneath; the bright objects to the right of the elongated galaxy are not part of the quartet.






A dramatic triplet of galaxies Arp 195 takes centre stage in this latest Picture of the Week from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, which captures a three-way gravitational tug-of-war between interacting galaxies.


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## lexluthermiester (Jul 26, 2021)

And another 2160p wallpaper:

Enjoy!


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## Drone (Jul 28, 2021)

Oh boy, this is awesome!

Scientists capture most-detailed radio image of Andromeda galaxy to date (ubc.ca)






Radio image of Andromeda galaxy at 6.6 GHz, captured using the Sardinia Radio Telescope in Italy. Credit: S. Fatigoni et al. (2021)


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## Drone (Aug 1, 2021)

From 156 million ly away the heart of active galaxy IC 5063 reveals a mixture of bright rays and dark shadows coming from the blazing core, home of a supermassive black hole.
Astronomers suggest that a ring of dusty material surrounding the black hole may be casting its shadow into space. According to this scenario, the interplay of light and shadow may occur when light blasted by the monster black hole strikes the dust ring, which is buried deep inside the core. Light streams through gaps in the ring, creating the brilliant cone-shaped rays. However, denser patches in the disk block some of the light, casting long, dark shadows through the galaxy.






Apollo 15 Commander David Scott drives the lunar roving vehicle on the surface of the Moon, the first time the rover was used (July 30, 1971).





On April 29, 2015, NuSTAR, Hinode, and Solar Dynamics Observatory all stared at our Sun. The active regions across the Sun’s surface contain material heated to several millions of degrees. The blue-white areas showing the NuSTAR data pinpoint the most energetic spots.


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## Drone (Aug 4, 2021)

Spiral galaxy IC 1954 takes center stage in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The galaxy, which lies ~ 45 million ly from us in the constellation Horologium, boasts a bright central bar and lazily winding spiral arms threaded with dark clouds of dust.


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## Drone (Aug 5, 2021)

In this self-portrait from 2018, Curiosity sits atop Vera Rubin Ridge, which the rover had been investigating. Directly behind the rover is the start of a clay-rich slope scientists are eager to begin exploring.









						Why Is This Weird, Metallic Star Hurtling Out of the Milky Way?
					

BU astronomers analyzed light data from a piece of supernova shrapnel—a star called LP 40−365—to gain clues about where it came from




					www.bu.edu
				












						Hidden Supernova Spotted by Spitzer
					

The image shows galaxy Arp 148, captured by NASA's Spitzer and Hubble telescopes. Specially processed Spitzer data is shown inside the white circle, revealing infrared light from a supernova hidden by dust.




					www.jpl.nasa.gov


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## Drone (Aug 12, 2021)

Clustered at the center of this image are 6 luminous spots of light, four of them forming a circle around a central pair. Appearances can be deceiving, however, as this formation is not composed of 6 individual galaxies, but only 3: to be precise, a pair of galaxies and one distant quasar. Hubble data also indicates that there is a 7th spot of light in the very center, which is a rare 5th image of the distant quasar. This rare phenomenon is caused by the presence of two galaxies in the foreground that act as a lens.





Known as NGC 6523 or the Lagoon Nebula, M8 is a *giant cloud of gas and dust* where stars are born. At ~4000 ly from Earth, M8 provides astronomers an excellent opportunity to study the properties of very young stars. Many infant stars give off copious amounts of high-energy light including X-rays, which are seen in the Chandra data (pink). The X-ray data have been combined with an optical image of M8 from the Mt. Lemmon Sky Center in Arizona (blue and white).





In this 30-second exposure, a meteor streaks across the sky during the annual Perseid meteor shower, Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021, as seen from Spruce Knob, West Virginia.





This infrared view of Jupiter’s icy moon Ganymede was obtained by the Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) instrument aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft during its July 20, 2021, flyby.


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## Drone (Aug 16, 2021)

This jewel-bright image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows NGC 1385, a spiral galaxy 68 million ly away from Earth, which lies in the constellation Fornax.






Dark lines criss-cross the Chilean sky at ESO’s Paranal Observatory, making the brightest region of the Milky Way play hide-and-seek with ESO’s VISTA telescope.


----------



## Drone (Sep 3, 2021)

ISS was orbiting 263 miles above the southeast coast of Brazil on the Atlantic Ocean into an orbital sunrise when this photograph was taken.






Galaxies and dark matter go together like peanut butter and jelly. Rarely is one without the other, but a recently discovered galaxy called NGC 1052-DF2 is nearly entirely lacking in dark matter.






How does a fish see the Milky Way? We can get a pretty good idea thanks to this picture of our galaxy, taken with a fisheye lens from the entrance of the Paranal Residencia at the Paranal Observatory’s Base Camp, located 3 km away from ESO’s Very Large Telescope.






This series of images captured on Aug. 22, 2021, shows asteroid 2016 AJ193 rotate as it was observed by Goldstone’s 70-m antenna. 1.3-km wide object was the 1001st near-Earth asteroid to be measured by planetary radar since 1968.


----------



## Drone (Sep 6, 2021)

Eclipsed Moon at Paranal​





Globular cluster NGC 6717 lies > 20k ly from us in the constellation Sagittarius. 
Globular clusters contain more stars in their centers than their outer fringes, as this image aptly demonstrates; the sparsely populated edges of NGC 6717 are in stark contrast to the sparkling collection of stars at its center.






Brilliant, Hot, Young Stars Shine in the Small Magellanic Cloud​The Small Magellanic Cloud  located 210k ly away, is one of the most dynamic and intricately detailed star-forming regions in space. At the center of the region is a brilliant star cluster called NGC 346. A dramatic structure of arched, ragged filaments with a distinct ridge surrounds the cluster.





Hurricane Ida As a Category 4 Storm​


----------



## Drone (Sep 7, 2021)




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## Drone (Sep 14, 2021)

AG Carinae — puffing dust bubbles and an erupting gas shell — the final acts of a monster star.






Northern and Southern Hemisphere at once — the whole night’s sky in one mind-bending image — something that would be impossible to see in real life. 
To create this image, photographers Petr Horálek and Juan Carlos Casado took two pictures at observatories located at the same latitudes in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.


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## lexluthermiester (Sep 14, 2021)

Once again, here is a 2160p(4K) resize of an awesome NASA photo suitable for wallpaper use!

Click to load, right click to download.

Credit to NASA for the photo, thanks to Drone for uploading it here!


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## pyrotenax (Sep 25, 2021)

There are some fantastic images in this thread and I look to contribute some of mine I have collected in the near future


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## ne6togadno (Sep 28, 2021)

Another aurora but this one is special as it is so bright. It is the full Moon lighting up the shadow side of Earth almost like daylight.
Credits: ESA/NASA–T. Pesquet
550N3468

original here


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## lexluthermiester (Jan 17, 2022)

This happened;








Scott Manley did a video that was very informative.








That is one big boom! I feel bad for the peoples of Tonga...
There is a GoFundMe page for disaster relief.








						Tonga Tsunami relief by Pita Taufatofua, organized by Pita Taufatofua
					

Hi All, Pita Taufatofua, the Tongan Flag Bearer here. As you all know a large … Pita Taufatofua needs your support for Tonga Tsunami relief by Pita Taufatofua



					www.gofundme.com


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## Chomiq (Apr 5, 2022)

Hubble Views a Galaxy with an Active Black Hole
					

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals tendrils of dark dust threading across the heart of the spiral galaxy NGC 7172.




					www.nasa.gov
				





> When astronomers inspected NGC 7172 across the electromagnetic spectrum they quickly discovered that there was more to it than meets the eye: NGC 7172 is a Seyfert galaxy – a type of galaxy with an intensely luminous active galactic nucleus powered by matter accreting onto a supermassive black hole.


----------



## ExcuseMeWtf (Apr 20, 2022)

Celebrating Hubble's 32nd Birthday with an Eclectic Galaxy Grouping
					

In a lonely patch of the universe, five tightly grouped galaxies engage in a leisurely dance.




					www.nasa.gov
				




On video:


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## Space Lynx (Jun 9, 2022)




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## ExcuseMeWtf (Jun 10, 2022)

Awesome video from Astrum


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## BetrayerX (Oct 24, 2022)




----------

