The Orion nebula is featured in this sweeping image from Nasa’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. The constellation of Orion is prominent in the evening sky throughout the world from about December through to April of each year. See more images from a month in space
Photograph: UCLA/JPL-Caltech/Nasa
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Tattered Remnants of a Star
10,000 light-years away in the constellation of Cassiopeia, a massive star went supernova, collapsing under the weight of its own gravity and blowing its outer layers into space, causing its own explosive demise. Shattered fragments are all that remain of the star—a huge swirls of debris and stellar ejecta called Cassiopeia A. It contains gases of 10 million degrees Celsius, created when the supernova flung out materials that smashed into surrounding dust and gas at speeds of 16 million km/hour. Cas A is actually the strongest radio source in the sky beyond our solar system, and the images above show the remnants in both optical and X-ray wavelengths, capturing the complex, intricate structure of the debris, fascinating in its utter destruction. The false colours indicate chemical compositions: bright green filaments are rich in oxygen, red and purple are sulphur, and blue are hydrogen and nitrogen. The light of Cas A first reached Earth just 340 years ago, so it’s one of the youngest and freshest such remnants we know of in the Milky Way. Studying it will help us understand the evolution of the universe. But it still holds some mysteries—take a closer look at the last image, and note the small turquoise dot right in the centre. Astronomers believe this is a neutron star—an ultra-dense star created during the supernova. Years of observation have shown unexpected rapid cooling of the star, which is thought to be caused by superfluids in its dense core. Superfluids are extremely bizarre but super cool, and you can read more about them from NASA.
(Image credit: Hubble/Chandra)
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Fermi’s Motion Produces a Study in Spirograph
NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope orbits our planet every 95 minutes, building up increasingly deeper views of the universe with every circuit. This image compresses eight individual frames, from a movie showing 51 months of position and exposure data by Fermi’s Large Area Telescope (LAT), into a single snapshot. The pattern reflects numerous motions of the spacecraft, including its orbit around Earth, the precession of its orbital plane, the manner in which the LAT nods north and south on alternate orbits, and more.
The LAT sweeps across the entire sky every three hours, capturing the highest-energy form of light — gamma rays — from sources across the universe. These range from supermassive black holes billions of light-years away to intriguing objects in our own galaxy, such as X-ray binaries, supernova remnants and pulsars.
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Source: nasa.gov
Hubble Views a Dwarf Galaxy - The constellation of Ursa Major (The Great Bear) is home to Messier 101, the Pinwheel Galaxy. Messier 101 is one of the biggest and brightest spiral galaxies in the night sky. Like the Milky Way, Messier 101 is not alone, with smaller dwarf galaxies in its neighborhood. NGC 5477, one of these dwarf galaxies in the Messier 101 group, is the subject of this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Without obvious structure, but with visible signs of ongoing star birth, NGC 5477 looks much like an typical dwarf irregular galaxy. The bright nebulae that extend across much of the galaxy are clouds of glowing hydrogen gas in which new stars are forming. These glow pinkish red in real life, although the selection of green and infrared filters through which this image was taken makes them appear almost white. The observations were taken as part of a project to measure accurate distances to a range of galaxies within about 30 million light-years from Earth, by studying the brightness of red giant stars. Credit: NASA
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Saturn’s B ring is spread out in all its glory in this image from Cassini. Scientists are trying to better understand the origin and nature of the various structures seen in the B ring.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Saturn’s B ring is the densest and most massive of all the rings. The C ring is also visible inside the B ring and the A ring puts on an appearance beyond the Cassini Division near the top and bottom of the image.
This view looks toward the sunlit side of the rings from about 7 degrees above the ringplane. The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera on July 22, 2012.
The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 201,000 miles (324,000 kilometers) from Saturn and at a Sun-Saturn-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 134 degrees. Image scale is 10 miles (16 kilometers) per pixel.
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This new global view of Earth’s city lights is a composite assembled from data acquired by the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite.
Credit: NASA’s Earth Observatory/NOAA/DOD
The data was acquired over nine days in April 2012 and 13 days in October 2012. It took 312 orbits to get a clear shot of every parcel of Earth’s land surface and islands. This new data was then mapped over existing Blue Marble imagery of Earth to provide a realistic view of the planet.
The image was made possible by the satellite’s “day-night band” of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite, which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe dim signals such as city lights, gas flares, auroras, wildfires and reflected moonlight.
The day-night band observed Hurricane Sandy, illuminated by moonlight, making landfall over New Jersey on the evening of Oct. 29. Night images showed the widespread power outages that left millions in darkness in the wake of the storm.
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The Galaxy Menagerie from WISE
A new, colorful collection of galaxy specimens has been released by NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, mission. It showcases galaxies of several types, from elegant grand design spirals to more patchy flocculent spirals. Some of the galaxies have roundish centers, while others have elongated central bars. The orientation of the galaxies varies as well, with some seeming to peer straight back at us in the face-on configuration while others point to the side, appearing edge-on.
Infrared light has been translated into colors we see with our eyes, such that the shortest wavelengths are blue and the longest are red. The oldest stars appear blue, while pockets of newly formed stars have yellow or reddish hues. Below is more information about each member of WISE’s galaxy collection. The order is from top left to right; middle left to right; and bottom left to right. Click on the name for high resolution individual images.
The Whirpool Galaxy, or Messier 51 (M51)
Known by astronomers as M51, this beauty is a grand design spiral, which are galaxies with well-defined spiral arms. Its smaller companion, a dwarf galaxy called NGC 5195, is thought to have helped define and shape the arms due to its gravitational “dance” with its larger partner. M51 is also known as “The Lord Ross galaxy,” after the astronomer who was the first to study its spiral structure in the 1840s. It is located 25 million light-years away in the constellation Canes Venatici, and is 81,000 light-years across.
Bode’s Galaxy, or Messier 81 (M81)
M81 is another grand design spiral galaxy, with pronounced arms spiraling into its core. WISE highlights areas where gas and dust have been compressed in the arms, leading to the formation of new stars. This compression has been enhanced by the galaxy’s interaction with its partner galaxy, Messier 82 (not pictured here). That galaxy is bursting with new stars, and is therefore known as a “starburst.” M81 is 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major, and 94,000 light-years across.
Southern Pinwheel Galaxy, or Messier 83 (M83)
At about 55,500 light-years across, M83 is s a bit more than half the size of our Milky Way Galaxy, but it has a similar overall structure. Like the Milky Way, most of M83’s stars, dust, and gas lie in a thin disk decorated with grand spiral arms. This galaxy is classified as a barred spiral because, in addition to a central bulge of stars, it has a central bar-shaped region of stars. It is 15 million light-years away in the constellation Hydra.
NGC 628, or Messier 74 (M74)
Some astronomers call the grand design spiral Messier 74 the “perfect spiral,” for its exceptional symmetry. It is suspected to have a black hole at its center, with a mass equal to 10,000 suns. It is one of only a handful of known black holes with masses intermediate between the relatively smaller ones that form from collapsing stars and the supermassive black holes millions of times more massive than the sun. Supermassive black holes are more typically found at the centers of galaxies. Messier 74 is located between 24.5 and 36 million light-years away in the constellation Pisces, and is 100,000 light-years across.
NGC 1398
This barred spiral has a dense inner ring that surrounds a bright, central core. The ring is actually two spiral arms that are closed in on each other. In contrast to its well-defined center, this galaxy’s arms are patchy, or flocculent. It is inclined about 43 degrees away from an edge-on orientation, and has a diameter of 135,000 light-years. NGC 1398 is 65 million light-years away in the Fornax constellation, and is part of the Fornax cluster of galaxies.
NGC 2403
This fuzzy-looking galaxy is a flocculent, or patchy, spiral. It is largely veiled by gas and dust at visible-light wavelengths, but when viewed with WISE, its arms are clearly revealed. In 2004, NGC 2403 was host to one of the largest supernova in recent decades — SN 2004dj was first observed in 2004 in Japan and was visible for 8 months. NGC 2403 is located 11.4 million-light years away in the constellation Camelopardalis, and is about 73,000 light-years across.
Splinter or Knife Edge galaxy, or NGC 5907
This galaxy’s face is angled about 90 degrees from our view, so it appears edge-on and thin as a splinter, or knife. It was discovered by the astronomer William Herschel in 1788. There is a large complex of stellar streams surrounding the galaxy, which can’t be seen in the WISE image. These are the torn-up shreds of smaller galaxies that were consumed. The faint green hue seen in the WISE composite is due to the “halo” of old stars that encircles the central region of the galaxy. The Splinter galaxy is about 53 million light-years away in the constellation Draco, and is nearly 200,000 light-years across.
Barnard’s Galaxy, IC 4895 or NGC 6822
Barnard’s galaxy is known as a dwarf for its small size — it has only about one percent of the mass of the Milky Way. The galaxy’s irregular shape is dominated by a central bar of stars, whose appearance resembles that of the nearby satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud. It is therefore given a classification of “Magellanic type.” The prominent yellow blobs seen against the blue stellar background are sites of recent star formation. Barnard’s galaxy is 1.6 million light-years away in the Sagittarius constellation, and is about 7,000 light-years across.
Hidden Galaxy, or IC342
Sometimes called the Hidden galaxy, this spiral beauty is shrouded behind our own galaxy, the Milky Way. Stargazers and professional astronomers have a hard time seeing the galaxy through the Milky Way’s bright band of stars, dust and gas. WISE’s infrared vision cuts through this veil, offering a crisp view. The nucleus is very bright at infrared wavelengths, due to a burst of new stars forming there. The Hidden galaxy is located about 10 million light-years away in the constellation Camelopardalis, and is 62,000 light-years across.
The colors used in all of these image represent specific wavelengths of infrared light. Blue and cyan represent 3.4- and 4.6-micron light, mainly emitted by hot stars. Green and red represent 12- and 22-micron wavelengths, primarily light emitted from warm dust.
JPL manages the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The principal investigator, Edward Wright, is at UCLA. The mission was competitively selected under NASA’s Explorers Program managed by the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. The science instrument was built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory, Logan, Utah, and the spacecraft was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., Boulder, Colo. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.
More information is online at http://www.nasa.gov/wise and http://wise.astro.ucla.edu.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA
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Lunar Nearside
Credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State Univ. / Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter
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Source: apod.nasa.gov
Earth at Night
Sometimes, a little bit of perspective can be breathtaking. At night the International Space Station can see brilliant auroras, the curve of the earth, networks of city lights spreading out like veins—and sometimes all three at once. Feast your eyes on some of the best images from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Centre Flickr stream.
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On August 6th NASA landed a rover on Mars, this is the very first picture
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Hoag’s Object: A Strange Ring Galaxy
Credit: R. Lucas (STScI/AURA), Hubble Heritage Team, NASA
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Source: apod.nasa.gov
Mars Curiosity Rover
Launched on November 26th, 2011, NASA’s newest Mars rover Curiosity will soon be touching down on Mars. It’s basically a laboratory on wheels, carrying the biggest and most advanced instruments ever sent to Martian surface, which will be used to work towards the mission’s overarching goal of assessing whether Mars is or ever has been habitable. This means searching for environmental conditions favourable to microbial life, especially in the carefully-chosen landing site: the foot of a mountain in Gale Crater, near the equator, which is expected to contain “hydrated-minerals”—Curiosity will devote much of its time looking for subterranean water, as liquid water is thought to be one of the key requirements of habitability. The rover will test for water by shoving neutrons beneath the surface, since water absorbs them more than other substances. Neutrons have already been used by the Mars Odyssey spacecraft to find what’s believed to be ice reservoirs, but high above the planet, neutrons are in abundance—Curiosity will have to carry its own artificial neutron generator, which will be able to blast 10 million neutrons into the surface per pulse, at a rate of ten pulses per second. This brilliant SUV-sized laboratory will land on August 6, taking its first steps on a planet 137 million kilometres from home.
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What does space smell like?
It’s strange to think that the near-vacuum of space could have a smell, and stranger still that humans—atmospheric creatures—can actually experience it. Astronauts have consistently reported the same strange odour after lengthy space walks, bringing it back in on their suits, helmets, gloves and tools. It’s bitter, smoky, metallic smell—like seared steak, hot metal and arc welding smoke all rolled into one. NASA have asked a chemist, Steve Pearce, to reproduce the smell to use during acclimatization training, mapping out the likely chemistry using natural materials to mimic the odor for accuracy. It’s believed that the smell is caused by high-energy vibrations in particles that mix with the air when brought inside. In the future, we might even recreate the smell of the moon, Mars, Mercury or any place in the universe, provided we have the right chemical information. In fact, we can even recreate the smell of the heart of the galaxy—astronomers searching for animo acids in Sagittarius B2, a vast dust cloud in the middle of the Milky Way, have reported that due to a substance called ethyl formate, it smells and tastes of raspberries and rum—much more pleasant than seared steak and metal.
Read an interview with Steve Pearce
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How are black holes formed?
Black Holes are the densest, most massive singular objects in the universe—nothing can escape their pull, not even light. Theory holds that they are created when stars collapse under their own gravity, forming a point or a ring of infinite density—singularity. The nuclear fusion in a star’s core produces electromagnetic radiation that exerts outward pressure, balancing the enormous gravity of the star’s mass, but when the nuclear fuel is exhausted, stability cracks and gravity compresses the star inwards. If the star is sufficiently massive—theory suggests it must be three times as massive as our sun—then the gravitational force is strong enough to collapse the star into a black hole. Soon the radius of star shrinks to critical size, called the Schwarzchild radius or event horizon: the boundary beyond which nothing cannot escape, not even light, because the strength of the gravitational pull is too great. The radius for determining an object’s Schwarzchild radius is Rs=2GM/c^2, where M is the mass of the body, G is the universal constant of gravitation, and c is the speed of light—and anything that’s smaller than its Schwarzchild radius is a black hole. When a star reaches this radius, it starts to devour anything that comes too close—but what happens to material within the Scwarzchild radius, however, is a mystery. It collapses indefinitely to the point where our understanding of the laws of physics breaks down.
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The Sound of a Fermi Gamma-ray Burst
The NASA blog has posted a video, turning the above data-capture graph of ‘a gamma-ray burst, the most energetic explosions in the universe’ (above) into a piece of music:
What does the universe look like at high energies? Thanks to the Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT), we can extend our sense of sight to “see” the universe in gamma rays. But humans not only have a sense of sight, we also have a sense of sound. If we could listen to the high-energy universe, what would we hear? What does the universe sound like?
… In translating the gamma-ray measurements into musical notes we assigned the photons to be “played” by different instruments (harp, cello, or piano) based on the probabilities that they came from the burst. This particular conversion is a fairly simple one; We built this on work done by other members of the LAT team (Luca Baldini and Alex Drlica-Wagner) who explored converting our data into music in different ways.
In the beginning of the song, before the burst starts, the harp plucks out a few lonely notes. After about half a minute, the piano joins in on top of the harp background, and the notes begin to pile on more and more rapidly. The cello enters the scene as the burst begins in earnest.
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