Astronomy & Space Exploration.

Let's have fun with astronomy and space exploration. We post interesting stuff about astronomy and deep space.

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A Spectacular, Multi-Wavelength View of Cygnus A

Cygnus A is a powerful radio galaxy located about 700 million light-years away from us in the direction of the Cygnus constellation. It contains a giant bubble filled with hot, X-ray emitting gas. Very powerful jets emanate from the center of the galaxy.

In this color-coded picture, the color blue represents X-ray radiation observed by the Chandra X-ray Observatory.

The color red represents radio waves captured by the Very Large Array (a set of 27 radio antennas) of National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO).

The color yellow represents visible light from the Hubble Space Telescope and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

A radio galaxy is a type of active galaxy that is very luminous at radio wavelengths.

The radio emissions from Cygnus A extend for nearly 300,000 light-years from the center of the galaxy to either side along the same axis. They are powered by jets of relativistic particles emanating from matter accreting into the galaxy's central supermassive black hole. Hot spots likely mark the ends of the jets impacting surrounding cool, dense material.

Image: -

    X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/STScI; Radio: NSF/NRAO/AUI/VLA.

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Supernova Remnant E0519-69.0

This picture shows an expanding shell of debris left behind by a star that exploded in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

In this picture of supernova remnant "E0519-69.0," the color blue represents X-rays observed by the Chandra X-ray Observatory. X-rays are emitted by extremely hot gas at multi-million degrees. The outer edge of the explosion (red) and stars in the field of view were captured in visible light by the Hubble Space Telescope.

A supernova is a stellar explosion that briefly outshines an entire galaxy, radiating as much energy as the Sun or any ordinary star is expected to emit over its entire life span, before fading from view over several weeks or months.

A supernova remnant (SNR) is the structure resulting from a supernova. It consists of ejected material expanding from the explosion, an expanding shock wave, and the interstellar material that it sweeps up and shocks along the way.

The Large Magellanic Cloud is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way Galaxy, located about 163,000 light-years away from us in the direction of the southern constellations of Dorado and Mensa.

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    X-ray: NASA/CXC/Rutgers/J.Hughes; Optical: NASA/STScI.

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"MESSENGER Is Dead, Long Live Its Mercury Imagery"

The robotic spacecraft MESSENGER has run out of fuel. With no way to make major adjustments to its orbit around the planet Mercury, the probe will smash into the surface at more than 8,750 miles per hour (3.91 kilometers per second). The impact will add a new crater to the planet's scarred face that engineers estimate will be as wide as 52 feet (16 meters).

MESSENGER: The Final Message

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The Milky Way over Nugget Point Lighthouse, New Zealand

Photo: Daniel Kordan

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A Sharp View of the Gorgeous Spiral Galaxy NGC 2841

This sharp view of spiral galaxy NGC 2841 shows its striking yellow nucleus and the reddish-brown dust lanes in its galactic disk. Pink star-forming regions, and young blue star clusters are embedded in its patchy, tightly wound spiral arms.

The rapid outflows of gas from giant stars, and supernova explosions in the disk of the galaxy create huge shells or bubbles of hot gas that expand rapidly and rise above the disk like plumes of smoke from a chimney. In this picture, the plumes of hot gas extend into a halo around the galaxy.

NGC 2841 is located about 46 million light-years away from us in the direction of the Ursa Major constellation. Its diameter is over 150,000 light-years.

This composite image was created by merging images from the Hubble Space Telescope and the Subaru Telescope.

Picture Credit: Hubble, Subaru; Composition & Copyright: Roberto Colombari.

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SuitSat-1: A Discarded Spacesuit in Low Earth Orbit

Backdropped by the blackness of space and Earth's horizon, a spacesuit-turned-satellite called SuitSat-1 began its orbit around the Earth after it was discarded by the Expedition 12 crewmembers from the International Space Station on Feb 3, 2006.

SuitSat, an unneeded Russian Orlan spacesuit, was filled with old clothes, a weak radio transmitter, three batteries, and internal sensors. It was released by the crew to orbit the Earth. The radio transmitter faintly transmitted recorded voices of school children to amateur radio operators worldwide.

The suit circled the Earth twice before its radio signal became unexpectedly weak. SuitSat-1 continued to orbit every 90 minutes until it burned up in the Earth's atmosphere after a few weeks.

This picture shows the lifeless spacesuit photographed in 2006 just as it drifted away from the International Space Station.

Credit: ISS Expedition 12 Crew, NASA.

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Majestic Saturn casting a shadow on its icy rings.

This picture was shot by the robotic Cassini spacecraft on May 9, 2007 from a distance of approximately 1.1 million kilometers (700,000 miles) from Saturn. The image scale is about 62 kilometers (39 miles) per pixel.

Saturn never shows a crescent phase when viewed from Earth. The unilluminated side of its ring plane is another vista that is not visible from Earth.

This picture captures Saturn's majestic rings from the side of the ring plane opposite the Sun. It also shows the complex shadows of the rings on the planet, as well as the shadow of the planet on the rings.

The HD version of this picture also shows the moons Mimas (at 2 o'clock position), Janus (at 4 o'clock position), and Pandora (at 8 o'clock position). These moons are visible as tiny white dots in the HD picture.

Credit: NASA/ESA/JPL/Space Science Institute/Cassini Imaging Team

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N49 - A supernova remnant located in the Large Magellanic Cloud

A supernova remnant (SNR) is a structure resulting from the explosion of a supernova.

A magnetar, visible near the top of the image, hurtles through the supernova debris cloud at a speed of 70,000 kilometers per hour.

A magnetar is a type of neutron star with an extremely powerful magnetic field. The magnetic field decay powers the emission of high-energy electromagnetic radiation, particularly X-rays and gamma rays.

The blue blob on the far right appears to be moving at a speed of 7 million kilometers per hour. At that speed you could travel around the world in just 20 seconds!

N49 emits 10 times the Sun's total energy in X-rays alone.

Image: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Penn State/S. Park et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI/UIUC/Y. H. Chu & R. Williams et al.

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The Hubble Space Telescope

A picture of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope floating against the background of Earth. This picture was shot from Space Shuttle Columbia in 2002.

The Hubble Space telescope makes one orbit around Earth every 97 minutes, traveling at a speed of about 4.66 miles (7.5 kilometers) per second at an altitude of about 347 miles (559 kilometers) above sea-level.

This large telescope was launched in space by NASA in 1990. The initial goal for the telescope was to operate for at least 15 years. It has now been in operation for 25 years. The telescope is the length of a large school bus and weighs as much as two adult elephants.

Here are 10 of the most profound discoveries made by this telescope: -

It helped us measure the expansion rate of the universe, and also helped us determine the age of the universe to be about 13.77 billion years.

It was used to study the expansion history of the universe, including observations that, along with ground-based telescope observations, led to the discovery that the expansion of the universe is accelerating due to the mysterious "dark energy" phenomenon.

It was the first telescope to analyze the chemical makeup of the atmosphere of a planet outside our solar system.

It was used to determine that most galaxies have powerful black holes at their centers, including our own Milky Way galaxy.

The images captured by this telescope showed that young stars are encircled by flattened dusty disks, the region where planets are forming.

It led us to discover several previously unknown moons of Pluto.

It has shown us the birth and death of stars.

It has shown us galaxies that are billions of light years away.

It has also seen comet pieces crash into the atmosphere above Jupiter.

Scientists have learned a lot about space from pictures captured by this telescope. The pictures are very beautiful to look at, too.

What makes the Hubble Space Telescope different from other telescopes is that it sees space better than the telescopes on the surface of Earth.

The Earth's atmosphere changes and blocks some of the light that comes from space. Hubble orbits high enough above Earth to avoid distortions caused by its atmosphere.

Credit: NASA/ESA

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Hubble's 25th Anniversary Image: Westerlund II - The Celestial Fireworks

April 24 2015 marks the 25th anniversary of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope. On this occasion, NASA has declared a picture of Westerlund-II to be the official 25th anniversary image of the telescope.

Westerlund-II is a sparkling cluster of about 3,000 stars. It resides inside a vibrant star-forming region known as "Gum 29." It is located about 20,000 light-years away from Earth in the Carina constellation.

The Westerlund-II star-cluster is about 2-million years old. It contains some of our galaxy's hottest, brightest, and most massive stars.

The largest stars in the cluster are unleashing a torrent of ultraviolet light and hurricane-force winds that etch away the enveloping hydrogen gas cloud. This creates a fantasy celestial landscape of pillars, ridges, and valleys.

Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA), A. Nota (ESA/STScI), and the Westerlund-II Science Team.

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A Stunning Picture of Earth, Moon, and the Hubble Space Telescope.

This picture was shot by the crew of Space Shuttle Discovery from the orbit of the shuttle in December 1999.

A portion of the Hubble Space Telescope is visible on the right side of this image. Earth's atmosphere is visible on the left. A bright, full moon is in the center.

Image Credit: NASA

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Sisimiut, Greenland

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The Milky Way & the Northern Lights over Sisimiut, Greenland

Image: Mads & Trine (Flickr)

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A Black Hole with 12-Billion Solar Masses Scientists have discovered a black hole 12-billion times more massive than our Sun! The gigantic black-hole (called "SDSS J010013.02") is 12.8 billion light-years away from us, and 420-trillion times more luminous than our Sun. It formed when the Universe was just 900 million years old. According to scientists, "The existence of such black holes when the universe was less than one billion years old presents substantial challenges to theories of the formation and growth of black holes and the co-evolution of black holes and galaxies." Image: An artist's impression of a quasar with a supermassive black hole in the distant Universe. Image Credit: Zhaoyu Li/Shanghai Astronomical Observatory/PA Sources: - 1. http://edition.cnn.com/2015/02/26/world/space-black-hole-new/ 2. http://news.discovery.com/space/galaxies/baby-universe-spawned-weirdly-monstrous-black-hole-150225.htm

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A gorgeous picture of the Bode's Galaxy (a.k.a. Messier 81) This galaxy is located about 11.8 million light-years away from us in the direction of the Ursa Major (Great Bear) constellation. This Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) shows the galaxy's bright yellow nucleus, blue spiral arms, and sweeping, brownish cosmic dust lanes. Image: Subaru Telescope (NAOJ), Hubble Space Telescope; Processing & Copyright: Roberto Colombari & Robert Gendler.

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Our Beautiful Neighbor, the Dazzling Andromeda Galaxy. Credit: GALEX, JPL-Caltech, NASA

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A bright, open cluster of stars in the heart of the Rosette Nebula. Image Credit & Copyright: Don Goldman

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The Vela Supernova Remnant. This expanding shock wave spanning almost 100 light-years was formed by a star that exploded about 11,000 years ago in the Vela constellation (Southern Hemisphere). Light in many different colors and energy bands is formed by the ejected material flying away from the exploded star. An incredibly dense pulsar, called the Vela Pulsar, is present in the center of the Vela Supernova Remnant. This pulsar rotates more than 11 times per second. A pulsar ('pulsating star') is a highly magnetized, rotating neutron star that emits a beam of electromagnetic radiation. Pulsars appear to 'pulse' because they rotate (an analogy would be the rotating light beam on top of a lighthouse). A neutron star is only about 12 miles (19 km) or so in diameter but it has a mass of about 1.4 times that of our Sun. This means that a neutron star is so dense that one teaspoonful of it would weigh a billion tons on Earth! Image: Digitized Sky Survey, ESA/ESO/NASA FITS Liberator, Davide De Martin (Skyfactory)