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Keyword: astronomy

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  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Messier 77

    05/10/2013 4:36:33 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 9 replies
    NASA ^ | May 10, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Face-on spiral galaxy M77 lies a mere 47 million light-years away toward the aquatic constellation Cetus. At that estimated distance, the gorgeous island universe is about 100 thousand light-years across. Also known as NGC 1068, its compact and very bright core is well studied by astronomers exploring the mysteries of supermassive black holes in active Seyfert galaxies. M77 is also seen at x-ray, ultraviolet, infrared, and radio wavelengths. But this sharp visible light image based on Hubble data follows its winding spiral arms traced by obscuring dust clouds and red-tinted star forming regions close in to the galaxy's luminous...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Ring of Fire over Monument Valley

    05/09/2013 3:35:13 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 4 replies
    NASA ^ | May 09, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: As the New Moon continues this season's celestial shadow play, an annular solar eclipse track begins in western Australia at 22:30 UT on May 9 -- near sunrise on May 10 local time. Because the eclipse occurs within a few days of lunar apogee, the Moon's silhouette does not quite cover the Sun during mid-eclipse, momentarily creating a spectacular ring of fire. While a larger region witnesses a partial eclipse, the annular mid-eclipse phase is visible along a shadow track only about 200 kilometers wide but 13,000 kilometers long, extending across the central Pacific. For given locations along it,...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Earth's Major Telescopes Investigate GRB 130427A

    05/08/2013 3:41:52 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 16 replies
    NASA ^ | May 08, 2013 | (see photo credit)
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Galaxy Cove Vista

    05/07/2013 3:42:05 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 8 replies
    NASA ^ | May 07, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: To see a vista like this takes patience, hiking, and a camera. Patience was needed in searching out just the right place and waiting for just the right time. A short hike was needed to reach this rugged perch above a secluded cove in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park in California, USA. And a camera was needed for the long exposure required to bring out the faint light from stars and nebula in the background Milky Way galaxy. Moonlight and a brief artificial flash illuminated the hidden beach and inlet behind nearby trees in the above composite image taken...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Tails of Comet Lemmon

    05/06/2013 4:04:21 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 3 replies
    NASA ^ | May 06, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: What caused the interestingly intricate tails that Comet Lemmon displayed earlier this year? First of all, just about every comet that nears the Sun displays two tails: a dust tail and an ion tail. Comet Lemmon's dust tail, visible above and around the comet nucleus in off-white, is produced by sun-light reflecting dust shed by the comet's heated nucleus. Flowing and more sculptured, however, is C/2012 F6 (Lemmon)'s blue ion tail, created by the solar wind pushing ions expelled by the nucleus away from the Sun. Also of note is the coma seen surrounding Comet Lemmon's nucleus, tinted green...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- A Supercell Thunderstorm Cloud Over Montana

    05/05/2013 6:41:51 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 10 replies
    NASA ^ | May 05, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Is that a spaceship or a cloud? Although it may seem like an alien mothership, it's actually a impressive thunderstorm cloud called a supercell. Such colossal storm systems center on mesocyclones -- rotating updrafts that can span several kilometers and deliver torrential rain and high winds including tornadoes. Jagged sculptured clouds adorn the supercell's edge, while wind swept dust and rain dominate the center. A tree waits patiently in the foreground. The above supercell cloud was photographed in July west of Glasgow, Montana, USA, caused minor damage, and lasted several hours before moving on.
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Hungarian Spring Eclipse

    05/03/2013 10:21:18 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 7 replies
    NASA ^ | May 04, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Last week, as the Sun set a Full Moon rose over the springtime landscape of Tihany, Hungary on the northern shores of Lake Balaton. As it climbed into the clear sky, the Moon just grazed the dark, umbral shadow of planet Earth in the year's first partial lunar eclipse. The partial phase, seen near the top of this frame where the lunar disk is darkened along the upper limb, lasted for less than 27 minutes. Composited from consecutive exposures, the picture presents the scene's range of natural colors and subtle shading apparent to the eye. At next week's New...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Horsehead: A Wider View

    05/02/2013 9:12:19 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 1 replies
    NASA ^ | May 03, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Combined image data from the massive, ground-based VISTA telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope was used to create this wide perspective of the interstellar landscape surrounding the famous Horsehead Nebula. Captured at near-infrared wavelengths, the region's dusty molecular cloud sprawls across the scene that covers an angle about two-thirds the size of the Full Moon on the sky. Left to right the frame spans just over 10 light-years at the Horsehead's estimated distance of 1,600 light-years. Also known as Barnard 33, the still recognizable Horsehead Nebula stands at the upper right, the near-infrared glow of a dusty pillar topped...
  • The Rose: Spinning Vortex of Saturn Polar Storm

    05/02/2013 7:44:45 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 11 replies
    Scientific Computing ^ | Tuesday, April 30, 2013 | unattributed
  • Stunning New Photo from the Space Station: The Moon Ushers in Dawn

    05/01/2013 6:45:38 PM PDT · by BenLurkin · 22 replies
    universetoday.com ^ | May 1, 2013 | Nancy Atkinson on
    During his evening ritual of sharing images taken from the International Space Station, Commander Chris Hadfield posted this gem: a gorgeous night-time view of the southeastern United States, with the Moon hovering over Earth’s limb and the terminator separating night from day. Dawn is just beginning to break to the east, as the ISS flies overhead. This image reflects the ‘wistful’ feelings Hadfield is having as his time in space in coming to a close. He and his two crewmates Tom Marshburn and Roman Romanenko will head back to Earth on May 13. During a recent linkup with students, Hadfield...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Omega Centauri: The Brightest Globular Cluster

    05/01/2013 3:47:21 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 10 replies
    NASA ^ | May 01, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: This huge ball of stars predates our Sun. Long before humankind evolved, before dinosaurs roamed, and even before our Earth existed, ancient globs of stars condensed and orbited a young Milky Way Galaxy. Of the 200 or so globular clusters that survive today, Omega Centauri is the largest, containing over ten million stars. Omega Centauri is also the brightest globular cluster, at apparent visual magnitude 3.9 it is visible to southern observers with the unaided eye. Cataloged as NGC 5139, Omega Centauri is about 18,000 light-years away and 150 light-years in diameter. Unlike many other globular clusters, the stars...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Humanity Explores the Solar System

    04/30/2013 5:10:54 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 14 replies
    NASA ^ | April 30, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: What spacecraft is humanity currently using to explore our Solar System? Presently, every inner planet has at least one robotic explorer, while several others are monitoring our Sun, some are mapping Earth's Moon, a few are chasing asteroids and comets, one is orbiting Saturn, and several are even heading out into deep space. The above illustration gives more details, with the inner Solar System depicted on the upper right and the outer Solar System on the lower left. Given the present armada, our current epoch might become known as the time when humanity first probed its own star system....
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Milky Way and Stone Tree

    04/29/2013 7:22:49 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 16 replies
    NASA ^ | April 29, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: What's that next to the Milky Way? An unusual natural rock formation known as Roque Cinchado or Stone Tree found on the Spanish Canary Island of Tenerife. A famous icon, Roque Cinchado is likely a dense plug of cooled volcanic magma that remains after softer surrounding rock eroded away. Majestically, the central band of our Milky Way Galaxy is visible arcing across the right of the above seven image panoramic mosaic taken during the summer of 2010. On the far right is the Teide volcano complete with a lenticular cloud hovering near its peak.
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- A Raging Storm System on Saturn

    04/28/2013 9:10:21 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 10 replies
    NASA ^ | April 28, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: It was one of the largest and longest lived storms ever recorded in our Solar System. † First seen in late 2010, the above cloud formation in the northern hemisphere of Saturn started larger than the Earth and soon spread completely around the planet. The storm was tracked not only from Earth but from up close by the robotic Cassini spacecraft currently orbiting Saturn. Pictured above in false colored infrared in February, orange colors indicate clouds deep in the atmosphere, while light colors highlight clouds higher up. The rings of Saturn are seen nearly edge-on as the thin blue...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Sharp Stereo [3D on Mars]

    04/27/2013 7:56:31 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 5 replies
    NASA ^ | April 27, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Get out your red/blue glasses and gaze across the floor of Gale crater on Mars. From your vantage point on the deck of the Curiosity Rover Mount Sharp, the crater's 5 kilometer high central mountain looms over the southern horizon. Poised in the foreground is the rover's robotic arm with tool turret extended toward the flat veined patch of martian surface dubbed "John Klein". A complete version of the stereo view spans 360 degrees, digitally stitched together from the rover's left and right navigation camera frames taken in late January. The layered lower slopes of Mount Sharp, formally known...
  • CURSE you, EINSTEIN! Humanity still chained in relativistic PRISON

    04/26/2013 10:05:36 AM PDT · by Red Badger · 15 replies
    www.theregister.co.uk ^ | 04-26-2013 | By Lewis Page
    'Collapsar jump' from Forever War seemingly not on cards Disappointing news on the science wires today, as new research indicates that a possible means of subverting the laws of physics to allow interstellar travel apparently doesn't work. As we are told in a new paper just published in hefty boffinry mag Science: Neutron stars with masses above 1.8 solar masses possess extreme gravitational fields, which may give rise to phenomena outside general relativity. That would be quite handy, as one of the rules of general relativity is that nothing can travel faster than light: which means that journeys between the...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- A Year on the Sun

    04/25/2013 9:46:20 PM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 21 replies
    NASA ^ | April 26, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: Our solar system's miasma of incandescent plasma, the Sun may look a little scary here. The picture is a composite of 25 images recorded in extreme ultraviolet light by the orbiting Solar Dynamics Observatory between April 16, 2012 and April 15, 2013. The particular wavelength of light, 171 angstroms, shows emission from highly ionized iron atoms in the solar corona at a characteristic temperatures of about 600,000 kelvins (about 1 million degrees F). Girdling both sides of the equator during the approach to maximum in its 11-year solar cycle, the solar active regions are laced with bright loops and...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Lunar Eclipses

    04/25/2013 3:45:10 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 3 replies
    NASA ^ | April 25, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: The dark, inner shadow of planet Earth is called the umbra. Shaped like a cone extending into space, it has a circular cross section and is most easily seen during a lunar eclipse. But the complete cross section is larger than the Moon's angular size in the stages of an eclipse. Still, this thoughtful composite illustrates the full extent of the circular shadow by utilizing images from both partial and total eclipses passing through different parts of the umbra. The images span the years 1997 to 2011, diligently captured with the same optics, from Voronezh, Russia. Along the bottom...
  • Science & the Virgin of Guadalupe [Catholic Caucus]

    12/12/2011 4:21:55 PM PST · by Salvation · 23 replies · 1+ views
    CatholicArtwork ^ | not given | Audra Fernando Garcia
    Science & the Virgin of Guadalupe Read what science has discovered about the tilma of the Virgin of Guadalupe Download a high-resolution image of the Our Lady of Guadalupe here 1. Ophthalmic studies made on the eyes of Mary detected that when the eye is exposed to light, the retina contracts, and when the light is withdrawn, it returns to a dilated state, just as happens with a living eye. 2. The temperature of Juan Diego’s tilma, made of a material that comes from fibers of the maguey cactus, maintains a constant temperature of 98.6 degrees, the same as that...
  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Wringing a Wet Towel in Orbit

    04/24/2013 3:38:50 AM PDT · by SunkenCiv · 4 replies
    NASA ^ | April 24, 2013 | (see photo credit)
    Explanation: What happens if you wring out a wet towel while floating in space? The water shouldn't fall toward the floor because while orbiting the Earth, free falling objects will appear to float. But will the water fly out from the towel, or what? The answer may surprise you. To find out and to further exhibit how strange being in orbit can be, Expedition 35 Commander Chris Hadfield did just this experiment last week in the microgravity of the Earth orbiting International Space Station. As demonstrated in the above video, although a few drops do go flying off, most of...