Hubble Sees Glittering Globular Cluster Embedded Inside Our Milky Way

Hubble's colorful image of the globular star cluster Terzan 12 is a spectacular example of how dust in space affects starlight coming from background objects.

from NASA http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2023/hubble-sees-glittering-globular-cluster-embedded-inside-our-milky-way
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The Large Cloud of Magellan

The 16th century Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan and his crew had plenty of time to study the southern sky during the first circumnavigation of planet Earth. As a result, two fuzzy cloud-like objects easily visible to southern hemisphere skygazers are known as the Clouds of Magellan, now understood to be satellite galaxies of our much larger, spiral Milky Way galaxy. About 160,000 light-years distant in the constellation Dorado, the Large Magellanic Cloud is seen in this sharp galaxy portrait. Spanning about 15,000 light-years or so, it is the most massive of the Milky Way's satellite galaxies and is the home of the closest supernova in modern times, SN 1987A. The prominent patch above center is 30 Doradus, also known as the magnificent Tarantula Nebula, a giant star-forming region about 1,000 light-years across.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230907.html ( September 07, 2023)

Practicing for the OSIRIS-REx Sample Return

A recovery team member takes part in field rehearsals in preparation for the retrieval of the sample return capsule from NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission in this image from Aug. 29, 2023.

from NASA http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/practicing-for-the-osiris-rex-sample-return
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They may look like modern mechanical dinosaurs, but they are enormous swiveling eyes that watch the sky. The High Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) Observatory is composed of four 12-meter reflecting-mirror telescopes surrounding a larger telescope housing a 28-meter mirror. They are designed to detect strange flickers of blue light -- Cherenkov radiation --emitted when charged particles move slightly faster than the speed of light in air. This light is emitted when a gamma ray from a distant source strikes a molecule in Earth's atmosphere and starts a charged-particle shower. H.E.S.S. is sensitive to some of the highest energy photons (TeV) crossing the universe. Operating since 2003 in Namibia, H.E.S.S. has searched for dark matter and has discovered over 50 sources emitting high energy radiation including supernova remnants and the centers of galaxies that contain supermassive black holes. Pictured in June, H.E.S.S. telescopes swivel and stare in time-lapse sequences shot in front of our Milky Way Galaxy and the Magellanic Clouds -- as the occasional Earth-orbiting satellite zips by.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230906.html ( September 06, 2023)

Voyager 1 Lifts Off Toward an Interstellar Journey

Voyager 1 Lifts Off Toward an Interstellar Journey

from NASA http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/voyager-1-lifts-off-toward-an-interstellar-journey
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ISS Daily Summary Report – 9/04/2023

 

Crew-6 Dragon Endeavour Undock and Landing:  Crew Dragon Endeavour undocked from the PMA-2 docking port on Node 2 Forward of the ISS on Sunday September 3rd at 6:05 AM CDT. Later that day, at 11:17 PM CDT, Crew Dragon Endeavour splashed down near Jacksonville off the coast of Florida returning NASA astronauts Steve Bowen and Woody … ...

September 04, 2023 at 12:00PM
From NASA: https://blogs.nasa.gov/stationreport/2023/09/04/iss-daily-summary-report-9-04-2023/

The last full moon was doubly unusual. First of all, it was a blue moon. A modern definition of a blue moon is a second full moon to occur during one calendar month. Since there are 13 full moons in 2023, one month has to have two -- and that month was August. The first full moon was on August 1 and named a Sturgeon Moon. The second reason that the last full moon was unusual was because it was a supermoon. A modern definition of supermoon is a moon that reaches its full phase when it is relatively close to Earth -- and so appears a bit larger and brighter than average. Pictured, the blue supermoon of 2023 was imaged hovering far behind a historic castle and lighthouse in Syracuse, Sicily, Italy.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230905.html ( September 05, 2023)

As stars die, they create clouds. Two stellar death clouds of gas and dust can be found toward the high-flying constellation of the Swan (Cygnus) as they drift through rich star fields in the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy. Caught here within the telescopic field of view are the Soap Bubble (lower left) and the Crescent Nebula (upper right). Both were formed at the final phase in the life of a star. Also known as NGC 6888, the Crescent Nebula was shaped as its bright, central massive Wolf-Rayet star, WR 136, shed its outer envelope in a strong stellar wind. Burning through fuel at a prodigious rate, WR 136 is near the end of a short life that should finish in a spectacular supernova explosion. Discovered in 2013, the Soap Bubble Nebula is likely a planetary nebula, the final shroud of a lower mass, long-lived, Sun-like star destined to become a slowly cooling white dwarf. Both stellar nebulas are about 5,000 light-years distant, with the larger Crescent Nebula spanning about 25 light-years across. Within a few million years, both will likely have dispersed.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230904.html ( September 04, 2023)

Periodic comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 has broken up at least twice. A cosmic souffle of ice and dust left over from the early solar system, this comet was first seen to split into several large pieces during the close-in part of its orbit in 1995. However, in the 2006 passage, it disintegrated into dozens of fragments that stretched several degrees across the sky. Since comets are relatively fragile, stresses from heat, gravity and outgassing, for example, could be responsible for their tendency to break up in such a spectacular fashion when they near the hot Sun. The Hubble Space Telescope recorded, in 2006, the featured sharp view of prolific Fragment B, itself trailing a multitude of smaller pieces, each with its own cometary coma and tail. The picture spans over 3,000 kilometers at the comet's distance of 32 million kilometers from planet Earth.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230903.html ( September 03, 2023)

NGC 7023: The Iris Nebula

These cosmic clouds have blossomed 1,300 light-years away in the fertile starfields of the constellation Cepheus. Called the Iris Nebula, NGC 7023 is not the only nebula to evoke the imagery of flowers. Still, this deep telescopic image shows off the Iris Nebula's range of colors and symmetries embedded in surrounding fields of interstellar dust. Within the Iris itself, dusty nebular material surrounds a hot, young star. The dominant color of the brighter reflection nebula is blue, characteristic of dust grains reflecting starlight. Central filaments of the reflection nebula glow with a faint reddish photoluminescence as some dust grains effectively convert the star's invisible ultraviolet radiation to visible red light. Infrared observations indicate that this nebula contains complex carbon molecules known as PAHs. The dusty blue petals of the Iris Nebula span about six light-years.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230902.html ( September 02, 2023)