Planet Parade over Sydney Opera House

2022-04-26 Prasun Agrawal

The world is waking up to a picturesque planet parade. Just before dawn, the eastern skies over much of planet Earth are decorated by a notable line of familiar planets. In much of Earth's northern hemisphere, this line of planets appears most ...

The Great Nebula in Carina

2022-04-25 Ignacio Javier Diaz Bobillo

In one of the brightest parts of Milky Way lies a nebula where some of the oddest things occur. NGC 3372, known as the Great Nebula in Carina, is home to massive stars and changing nebulas. The Keyhole Nebula (NGC 3324), the bright structure just ...

Split the Universe

2022-04-24

Just now, before you hit the button, two future universes are possible. After pressing the button, though, you will live in only one. A real-web version of the famous Schrödinger's cat experiment clicking the red button in the featured ...

Messier 104

2022-04-23

A gorgeous spiral galaxy, Messier 104 is famous for its nearly edge-on profile featuring a broad ring of obscuring dust lanes. Seen in silhouette against an extensive central bulge of stars, the swath of cosmic dust lends a broad brimmed hat-like ...

Planet Earth at Twilight

2022-04-22

No sudden, sharp boundary marks the passage of day into night in this gorgeous view of ocean and clouds over our fair planet Earth. Instead, the shadow line or terminator is diffuse and shows the gradual transition to darkness we experience as ...

Apollo 16 Moon Panorama

2022-04-21

Fifty years ago, April 20, 1972, Apollo 16's lunar module Orion touched down on the Moon's near side in the south-central Descartes Highlands. While astronaut Ken Mattingly orbited overhead in Casper the friendly command and service module the ...

Planet Line over New York Bridge

2022-04-20 Stan Honda

There's an interesting sky to see if you wake up before the Sun. Lined up on toward the eastern horizon are four planets in a row. The planets are so bright they can even be seen from the bright sky inside a city. In fact, the featured image was ...

Stars and Globules in the Running...

2022-04-19 Stefan Steve Bemmerl

The eggs from this gigantic chicken may form into stars. The featured emission nebula, shown in scientifically assigned colors, is cataloged as IC 2944 but known as the Running Chicken Nebula for the shape of its greater appearance. Seen toward ...

Stars and Planets over Portugal

2022-04-18 Miguel ClaroTWAN

The mission was to document night-flying birds -- but it ended up also documenting a beautiful sky. The featured wide-angle mosaic was taken over the steppe golden fields in Mértola, Portugal in 2020. From such a dark location, an ...

Shuttle Over Earth

2022-04-17

What's that approaching? Astronauts on board the International Space Station in 2010 first saw it far in the distance. Soon it enlarged to become a dark silhouette. As it came even closer, the silhouette appeared to be a spaceship. Finally, the ...