Astronomy Picture of the Day |
APOD: 2009 March 11 - Lunar X
Explanation:
The striking X near the center of this lunarscape is easily
visible in binoculars or a small telescope.
Yet, not too many have seen it.
The catch is,
this lunar X is only apparent
during a four hour period
just before the Moon's
first quarter phase.
At the
terminator, or
shadow line between lunar day and night,
the X illusion is produced by a configuration of the craters
Blanchinus, La Caille and Purbach.
Near the Moon's first quarter phase, an
astronaut standing close to
the craters' position would see the slowly rising Sun very
near the horizon.
Temporarily, the
crater walls would be in sunlight
while the crater floors were still in darkness.
Seen from planet Earth,
contrasting sections of bright walls against
the dark floors by chance look remarkably like an X.
This sharp image of the Lunar X was captured at approximately 11:59 UT
on March 3, 2009.
The Moon's first quarter phase was at 7:46 UT on March 4.
APOD: 2009 March 8 - Gibbous Europa
Explanation:
Although the phase
of this moon might appear familiar, the moon itself might not.
In fact, this
gibbous phase shows
part of
Jupiter's moon
Europa.
The robot spacecraft
Galileo captured
this image mosaic during its
mission orbiting Jupiter from 1995 - 2003.
Visible are plains of
bright ice,
cracks that run to the horizon, and
dark patches
that likely contain both ice and dirt.
Raised terrain is
particularly apparent near the
terminator,
where it casts shadows.
Europa is nearly the same size as
Earth's Moon, but much smoother, showing few
highlands or
large impact craters.
Evidence and images from the
Galileo spacecraft,
indicated
that liquid oceans might exist below the icy
surface.
To test speculation that these seas hold life,
ESA and
NASA have together
started preliminary development of the
Europa Jupiter System Mission
, a spacecraft proposed to better study Europa.
If the surface ice is thin enough, a future mission might drop
hydrobots to burrow into the oceans
and search for life.
APOD: 2009 February 26 - Moon, Mercury, Jupiter, Mars
Explanation:
When the Moon rose in predawn skies on February 23rd,
it sported a sunlit crescent.
It also offered
early morning
risers a tantalizing view
of earthshine, the dark portion of the
lunar disk illuminated by
sunlight reflected from the Earth.
Of course, on that morning a remarkable
conjunction with three
wandering planets added an impressive touch to the
celestial scene.
Recorded just before sunrise,
this
serene skyview looks east toward
a glowing horizon across Tuggerah Lake on the Central Coast of New South
Wales, Australia.
Along with the waning
crescent Moon,
the picture captures (top to bottom) bright
Mercury,
Jupiter, and
Mars.
APOD: 2009 February 23 - An Etruscan Vase Moon Rising
Explanation:
What's happened to the Moon?
Nothing, although from some locations, February's full moon,
which occurred about two weeks ago, appeared
strangely distorted as it rose.
Visible in particular was a
curiously
inverted image section pinched off
near the horizon,
an effect dubbed the Etruscan vase by the pioneering science fiction writer
Jules Verne for its familiar shape.
This odd moon image piece was created by moonlight
refracting through an
atmospheric inversion layer on
Earth where cold air was
trapped near the surface.
The photographer also reported that, as the moon rose, a
red rim was faintly
visible on the lower part of the moon, while a
green rim appeared on the top.
Similar to the Sun's famous
green flash, these
effects arise
when the Earth's atmosphere acts like a
prism, sending different colors of light on slightly
different paths.
The above image mosaic has been
horizontally compressed by computer
to fit a standard screen.
APOD: 2009 February 19 - Mauna Kea Milky Way Panorama
Explanation:
Aloha and welcome to a breathtaking skyscape.
The dreamlike panoramic view looks out from the 4,200 meter volcanic
summit of Mauna Kea, Hawai'i,
across a layer of clouds toward a
starry night sky
and the rising Milky Way.
Anchoring the scene on the far left is the dome of the
Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope (CFHT), with
north
star Polaris shining beyond the dome to the right.
Farther right, headed by bright
star Deneb,
the Northern Cross asterism
is embedded along the plane of the Milky Way as it peeks above the
horizon.
Both Northern Cross and
brilliant white
Vega
hang over a foreground grouping of cinder cones.
Near the center are the reddish nebulae, stars and dust clouds of
the central Milky Way.
Below, illumination from the city lights of Hilo creates
an eerie, greenish glow in the clouds.
Red supergiant
star
Antares shines above the Milky Way's central bulge
while bright
Alpha
Centauri lies still farther right, along
the dusty galactic plane.
Finally, at the far right is the large
Gemini North Observatory.
The compact group of stars known as the
Southern Cross is just
left of the telescope dome.
Need some help identifying the stars?
Just slide your cursor over the picture, or download this smaller,
labeled
panorama.
APOD: 2009 February 6 - Space Station in the Moon
Explanation:
On February 2nd,
a first quarter
Moon
shone in planet Earth's
early evening sky.
As seen from a location on the US west coast near
Mt. Hamilton,
California, the
International Space Station also arched above
the horizon, crossing in front of the Moon's sunlit surface.
The space station's transit
lasted 0.49 seconds.
This sharp exposure, a well-timed
telescopic image,
recorded the space station during the transit
against the background of the
Moon's smooth Mare Serenitatis
(Sea of Serenity).
The orbital outpost was
traveling northwest to southeast
(from 2 o'clock to 8 o'clock) at a range of
389 kilometers or about 230 miles.
Of course, the
Moon itself was
1,000 times farther away.
In the remarkable photo, the glinting station also offers
a hint of the bluish reflection
of earthlight.
APOD: 2009 January 5 - Comet and Meteor
Explanation:
This meteor streaking toward the horizon through the early
morning sky
of January 4th is from the annual
Quadrantid meteor shower.
Aligned with the shower's radiant point
high in the north (off the top of the view), the meteor trail passes
to the right of bright bluish star Beta
Scorpii.
Remarkably, near the top of the trail is a small spot, the fuzzy
greenish glow of
a comet.
Discovered in July of 2007,
Comet Lulin
(C/2007 N3), is too faint now to
be easily seen by the unaided eye, but will
likely
brighten to become visible to skygazers by late February.
The well-timed
skyscape featuring both comet and meteor is particularly
appropriate as cometary bodies are known to be the
origins of planet Earth's
annual
meteor showers.
APOD: 2009 January 2 - Alpine Conjunction
Explanation:
Did you see it?
The last conjunction
of Moon and bright planets in 2008
featured a young crescent Moon
and brilliant Venus in the west after sunset on December 31st.
Seen here in dark, clear, mountain air from Mönichkirchen,
Austria, are the
two celestial beacons that dominate
planet Earth's night sky.
That pair was hard to miss, but
skygazers
watching lower along
the western horizon in early twilight might also have glimpsed
a pairing of Jupiter and Mercury as they both
wandered closer to the
Sun in the sky at year's end.
Still, while this single, 5 second long exposure seriously
overexposes the Moon's sunlit crescent, it does capture another
planet not visible to the unaided eye.
The tiny pinprick of light just above the photographer's head
in the picture is the distant
planet Neptune.
APOD: 2008 December 31 - The Sky in Motion
Explanation:
Still need to come up with a good new year's resolution?
Consider one appropriate for 2009, the
International Year of Astronomy;
just look up -- experience, learn, and enjoy the changing sky.
This 4-minute, time-lapse video is
composed from a series of 7,000 images highlighting
much of what you could see.
Arcing through the sky in a stately reflection of
planet Earth's
own rotation are
Moon,
Sun and
stars.
But the sequence also features
satellites and
meteors streaking overhead,
clouds moving
along the horizon changing in a beautiful
iridescence, and beaming
crepuscular
rays.
APOD: 2008 December 30 - Home from Above
Explanation:
There's no place like
home.
Peering out of the window of the
International Space Station (ISS), astronaut
Greg Chamitoff takes in the planet on which we were all born.
About 350 kilometers up, the ISS is high enough so that the
Earth's horizon appears clearly curved.
Astronaut Chamitoff's window shows some of Earth's
complex clouds,
in white, and life giving atmosphere and oceans, in
blue.
The space station orbits the Earth about once every 90 minutes.
It is not difficult for people living below to look back toward the ISS.
The ISS can frequently be seen as a bright point of
light drifting overhead just after sunset.
Telescopes can even resolve the
overall structure of the space station.
The above image was taken early last month from the ISS's
Kibo laboratory.
APOD: 2008 December 24 - Earthrise
Explanation:
Forty years ago, in December of 1968, the
Apollo 8 crew flew from the
Earth to the
Moon and back again.
Frank Borman,
James Lovell, and
William Anders were launched atop a
Saturn
V rocket on December 21,
circled the Moon ten times in their command module,
and returned to Earth on December 27.
The Apollo 8 mission's impressive
list of firsts includes: the first humans to journey to the
Earth's Moon, the first to fly using the
Saturn V rocket,
and the first to photograph
the Earth from deep space.
As the Apollo 8 command module rounded the farside of the Moon,
the crew could look toward the
lunar horizon and see the Earth appear
to rise, due to their spacecraft's orbital motion.
Their
famous picture of a distant blue Earth
above the Moon's limb
was a marvelous gift to the world.
APOD: 2008 December 16 - Orion Dawn Over Mount Nemrut
Explanation:
What's that in front of Orion?
Forty kilometers north of
Kahta,
Turkey,
lies
Mount Nemrut, a mountain adorned with the fragments of vast statues built over 2000 years ago.
The
stone sculptures
once stood nearly 10 meters high and depicted lions,
eagles,
various ancient
gods, and
King Antiochus I Theos, who ruled
Commagene
from 86 BC to 38 BC.
Ruins of the bodies of several sitting
figures are visible on the hill above, illuminated by
moonlight.
Zeus'
head can be found near the above image's center,
while the king's head is seen next closest to the horizon.
Visible far in the distance in
this image, taken three months ago, is the familiar
constellation of Orion.
The red patch just below
Orion's belt is the
Orion Nebula,
while the bright star to the left of Orion is
Sirius.
On the far left, a red and brightening horizon announces that the Sun is beginning to rise.
APOD: 2008 December 14 - Zodiacal Light Over New Mexico
Explanation:
An unusual triangle of light is visible this time of year just before dawn.
Once considered a false dawn, this triangle of light is actually
Zodiacal Light, light reflected from
interplanetary dust particles.
The triangle is clearly visible in the above image taken from
New Mexico,
USA, in October.
A telescope truss tube assembly and observatory domes of New Mexico
Skies fill the foreground of the early morning skyscape.
Zodiacal dust
orbits the Sun
predominantly in the same plane as the planets: the
ecliptic.
Zodiacal light is so bright this time of year because the
dust band is oriented
nearly vertical at sunrise,
so that the thick air near the horizon does not block
out relatively bright reflecting dust.
Zodiacal light is also bright for
people
in Earth's northern hemisphere in March and April just after sunset.
APOD: 2008 December 12 - Lick Observatory Moonrise
Explanation:
As viewed from a well chosen location
at sunset,
October's gorgeous Full Moon rose behind Mount Hamilton, east
of San Jose, California.
Captured in this lovely telescopic view, historic
Lick
Observatory is
perched
on the mountain's 4,200 foot summit,
observatory and rising Moon momentarily sharing the warm color
of filtered sunlight.
Of course, tonight those blessed with clear skies can also enjoy
a glorious Full Moon.
In fact, tonight's Moon reaches its full phase at 1637 UT,
within only a few hours of
perigee, the
closest point in its
elliptical orbit.
The close approach really will make
December's Full Moon the
largest Full Moon of 2008,
even when it rises high
above the horizon.
APOD: 2008 December 5 - Smile in the Sky
Explanation:
At sunset, Monday's western sky showed off stunning colors
and dramatic clouds reflected in
Brisbane Water on the Central Coast of New South Wales, Australia.
It also featured the
remarkable conjunction
of the crescent Moon,
Venus, and Jupiter forming a twilight smiley face.
While the gathering of the two bright planets and Moon
awed skygazers
around planet Earth, astronomer Mike Salway
reports taking special pains to record
this gorgeous view,
braving mosquitos and rain squalls along a soggy shore.
His southern hemisphere
perspective finds brilliant Venus at the highest point
in the celestial grouping.
For now, a bright pairing of Venus and Jupiter continues
to dominate the western horizon after sunset but the Moon has
moved on and tonight is near its
first quarter phase.
APOD: 2008 December 3 - A Happy Sky Over Los Angeles
Explanation:
Sunday, the sky seemed to smile over much of planet Earth.
Visible the world over was an unusual superposition of our Moon and the planets Venus and Jupiter.
Pictures taken at the right time show a crescent Moon that appears to be a smile when paired with the
planetary conjunction of seemingly nearby Jupiter and Venus.
Pictured above is the scene as it appeared from
Mt. Wilson Observatory
overlooking
Los Angeles,
California,
USA
after sunset on 2008 November 30.
Highest in the sky and farthest in the distance is the planet
Jupiter.
Significantly closer and visible to Jupiter's lower left is
Venus,
appearing through Earth's atmospheric clouds as unusually blue.
On the far right, above the horizon, is our Moon, in a
waxing crescent phase.
Thin clouds illuminated by the Moon appear unusually orange.
Sprawling across the bottom of the image are the hills of Los Angeles, many covered by a thin haze, while
LA skyscrapers are visible on the far left.
The conjunction of
Venus and Jupiter will
continue to be
visible
toward the west after sunset during much of this month.
Hours after the taking of this image, however,
the Moon approached the distant duo, briefly
eclipsed Venus, and then moved on.
APOD: 2008 November 22 - From Moonrise to Sunset
Explanation:
In this panorama of Earth and sky
recorded on Thursday, November 13, the
Full Moon
rises along the eastern horizon at the far left.
Of course, the
Full Moon rises at sunset and
that Thursday's setting Sun
was also captured at the far right.
In between, 17 digital images are stitched together to
follow the horizon to the south in a lovely twilight
portrait of the city of Lisbon, Portugal.
The serene view takes in part of the longest bridge in Europe, the
Vasco da
Gama bridge, beneath the rising Moon and ends at the mouth of the
Tagus River looking west toward the
sunset and the Atlantic Ocean.
The photographer's vantage point was Lisbon's 100 foot high
Cristo Rei monument
on the south bank of the Tagus, at the foot
of the port city's other famous bridge, the
Ponte 25 de Abril.
APOD: 2008 November 16 - Anticrepuscular Rays Over Colorado
Explanation:
What's happening over the horizon?
Although the scene may appear somehow
supernatural,
nothing more unusual is occurring than a
setting Sun and some well placed clouds.
Pictured above are
anticrepuscular rays.
To understand them, start by picturing common
crepuscular rays that are seen any time that sunlight pours though scattered clouds.
Now although sunlight indeed travels along
straight lines, the projections of these lines onto the
spherical sky are
great circles.
Therefore, the
crepuscular rays from a
setting (or rising) sun
will appear to re-converge on the other side of the sky.
At the anti-solar point 180 degrees around from the
Sun, they are referred to as
anticrepuscular rays.
Pictured above is a particularly striking set of
anticrepuscular rays photographed in 2001
from a moving car just outside of Boulder,
Colorado,
USA.
APOD: 2008 September 26 - Moon Rays over Byurakan Observatory
Explanation:
On September 7th, the first quarter Moon and passing clouds
contributed to a dramatic night sky over the
Byurakan
Astrophysical Observatory.
This panoramic view begins at the left looking toward the
eastern horizon and the rising stars of the constellation
Perseus.
Sweeping your gaze to the right (south), you'll find the
large observatory dome, housing a 2.6 meter diameter telescope,
backlit by lights from nearby Yerevan,
capital city of Armenia.
Fittingly poised above the observatory dome is the bright, giant
star Enif
in the high-flying constellation
Pegasus.
Farther to the right, the brightest celestial beacon
just above the clouds is our Solar System's ruling
gas giant Jupiter.
At the far right, the Moon is nearly hidden by an approaching
cloudbank, but the clouds themselves actually cast shadows
in the bright moonlight, creating
the effect of Moon rays
across the evening sky.
APOD: 2008 September 22 - Equinox: The Sun from Solstice to Solstice
Explanation:
Today is an equinox, a date when day and night are equal.
Tomorrow, and every day until the next
equinox,
the night will be longer than the day in Earth's northern hemisphere,
and the day will be longer than the night in Earth's southern hemisphere.
An equinox
occurs midway between the two
solstices,
when the days and nights are the least equal.
The picture is a composite of hourly images taken of the Sun above
Bursa, Turkey on key days from solstice to
equinox to solstice.
The bottom Sun band was taken during the
winter solstice in 2007 December, when
the Sun could not rise very high in the sky nor stay above the
horizon very long.
This lack of Sun caused
winter.
The top Sun band was taken during the
summer solstice in 2008 June, when the
Sun rose highest in the sky and stayed above the horizon
for more than 12 hours.
This abundance of Sun caused
summer.
The middle band was taken during the
Vernal Equinox in 2008 March, but it is the same sun band that
Earthlings will see today, the day of the
Autumnal Equinox.
APOD: 2008 September 12 - Planets over Perth
Explanation:
A bright trio of
terrestrial planets
was joined by a young Moon on September 1st,
in planet Earth's early evening skies.
In this view of the celestial gathering
from Perth,
Western Australia, the Moon's sunlit crescent is
nearly horizontal at Perth's southern latitude of about
32 degrees.
Venus, then
Mercury, and finally
Mars shine above
colorful city lights on the far shore of the Swan River.
The six unlit towers on the left surround a large
cricket stadium.
For now,
the planetary trio still lingers low in the west
just after sunset.
But in the coming days Venus will move farther from the Sun,
climbing higher after sunset,
while Mercury and Mars will steadily sink into the
glare along the western
horizon.
APOD: 2008 September 11 - Mountain Top Meteors
Explanation:
A mountain top above the clouds
and light-polluted cities
was a good place
to go to watch this August's
Perseid
meteor shower.
In fact, this composite picture from one of the highest points
in Romania, the Omu summit (2,507 meters) in the
Southern
Carpathian Mountains, captures about 20 of the shower's
bright streaks against a
starry night sky.
The cosmic debris stream that creates the shower is composed of
dust particles moving along parallel paths, following the orbit
of their parent comet
Swift-Tuttle.
Looking toward the shower's
radiant point
in the constellation Perseus,
perspective causes the parallel meteor streaks to appear
to diverge.
But looking directly away from the radiant point, as in this view,
perspective actually makes the Perseid meteors seem to be converging
toward a point below the horizon.
APOD: 2008 September 5 - Milky Way Road Trip
Explanation:
In search of planets and the summer
Milky Way,
astronomer Tunç Tezel took an evening
road trip.
Last Saturday, after driving the winding road up
Uludag,
a mountain near Bursa, Turkey, he was rewarded by this beautiful
skyview to the south.
Near the center, bright planet Jupiter outshines
the city lights below and the stars of the constellation
Sagittarius.
Above the mountain peaks, an arcing
cloud bank seems to lead to the Milky Way's own
cloudy apparition plunging into the distant horizon.
In Turkish, Uludag
means Great Mountain.
Uludag was known in
ancient times
as the Mysian Olympus.
APOD: 2008 August 16 - Perseid over Vancouver
Explanation:
Colorful and bright, the city lights of Vancouver, Canada
are reflected in the water in this portrait of
the world at night.
Recorded on August 12 during the
Perseid
Meteor Shower,
the wide-angle view takes in a large
swath along the photographer's eastern horizon.
The picture is a composite of many consecutive 2 second exposures
that, when added together, cover a
total time of an hour and 33 minutes.
During that time,
stars trailed
through the night sky above
Vancouver, their steady motion along concentric arcs
a reflection of planet Earth's
rotation.
The dotted trails of aircraft also cut across the scene.
Of course, two of the frames captured the brief, brilliant flash of
a Perseid fireball
as it tracked across the top of the field
of view.
The large gap in the single meteor trail corresponds to the time gap
between the consecutive frames.
APOD: 2008 August 14 - Perseid Trail
Explanation:
This bright and colorful
meteor flashed through Tuesday's
early morning skies, part of the annual
Perseid Meteor
Shower.
The lovely image is one of over 350 frames captured on August 12
from the Joshua Tree National Park,
in California, USA .
Dust from comet
Swift-Tuttle
is responsible for the
Perseids, creating the northern hemisphere's regular
summer sky show.
The comet dust is vaporized as it enters the atmosphere at upwards
of 60 kilometers per second, producing visible trails that begin at
altitudes of around 100 kilometers.
Of course, the trails point back to a
radiant point in
the constellation Perseus, giving the meteor shower its name.
Recorded after moonset, the starry background features the
bright star Vega on the right.
Extending below the western horizon is the faint band of the
northern Milky Way.
APOD: 2008 August 10 - The Eagle Rises
Explanation:
Get out your
red/blue glasses and
check out
this remarkable stereo view from lunar orbit.
Created from two photographs
(AS11-44-6633,
AS11-44-6634)
taken by astronaut Michael Collins
during the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, the 3D
anaglyph
features the lunar module ascent stage, dubbed The Eagle, as it rises to
meet the command module in lunar orbit.
Aboard the ascent stage are
Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, the first to
walk on the Moon.
The smooth, dark area on the lunar
surface is Mare Smythii located
just below the equator on the extreme eastern edge of the Moon's
near side.
Poised beyond the lunar horizon, is our
fair planet Earth.
APOD: 2008 July 29 - The Milky Way Over Ontario
Explanation:
Sometimes, after your eyes adapt to the dark, a spectacular sky appears.
Such was the case earlier this month over
Ontario,
Canada,
when part of a spectacular sky also became visible in a reflection off a lake.
To start, the brightest objects visible are bright stars and the
planet Jupiter, seen as the brightest spot on the upper left.
A distant town appears as a diffuse glow over the horizon.
More faint still, the disk of the
Milky Way Galaxy
becomes apparent as a dramatic diffuse
band
across the sky that seems to crash into the horizon far in the distance.
In the foreground, a picturesque landscape includes
trees, a lake, and a
stone wall.
Finally, on this serene night in July when the lake water was unusually calm,
reflections appear.
Visible in the lake are not only reflections of several bright stars, but part of the
Milky Way band itself.
Careful inspection of the image will reveal, however, that bright stars leave small trails in the lake reflections that do not appear in the
sky above.
The reason for this is because the above image is actually a
digital composite of time-consecutive
exposures from the same camera.
In the first set of exposures, sky images were co-added with slight
rotations to keep the stars in one place.
APOD: 2008 July 18 - Jupiter over Ephesus
Explanation:
A brilliant Jupiter shares the sky with the Full Moon tonight.
Since
Jupiter is near
opposition,
literally opposite
the Sun in planet Earth's sky, Jupiter will rise near sunset
just
like the Full Moon.
Of course, opposition is also the point of closest approach, with
Jupiter shining at its brightest and offering the best
views for skygazers.
Recorded late last month, this moving skyscape features
Jupiter
above the southeastern horizon and the marbled streets of the
ancient port city of
Ephesus,
located in modern day Turkey.
At the left is
a temple
dedicated
to the Roman emperor
Hadrian.
The beautiful night sky also includes the arc of
the northern summer Milky Way.
Lights on the horizon are from the nearby town of Selçuk.
Clicking on the image will download the scene as a panorama.
APOD: 2008 June 28 - Fireball at Ayers Rock
Explanation:
A weekend trip for astrophotography in central
Australia can
result in gorgeous skyscapes.
In this example recorded in March of 2006,
the center of our
Milky Way Galaxy rises over planet Earth's
horizon and the large sandstone formation called Uluru,
also known as Ayers Rock.
After setting up two cameras to automatically image this
celestial scene in a series of exposures,
one through a wide-angle and the other through a telephoto lens,
photographer Joseph Brimacombe briefly turned his back
to set up other equipment.
To his surprise, the ground around him suddenly lit up with
the brilliant flash of a
fireball meteor.
To his delight, both cameras captured the
bright meteor
streak.
Highlighted in the telephoto view (inset), the fireball trail
shines through cloud banks, just left of
Ayers Rock.
APOD: 2008 June 7 - June's Young Crescent Moon
Explanation:
Serene skyviews were enjoyed across planet Earth
earlier this week with a young
crescent Moon
low in the western sky just after sunset.
Recorded on June 4,
this
colorful example
includes a quiet beach
in the foreground with the city lights of Lisbon, Portugal,
and the Sintra Mountains along the horizon.
Posing between cloud banks, the Moon's slender, sunlit arc
represents only about 1 percent of the full lunar disc.
The rest of the Moon's nearside is faintly visible though,
illuminated
by Earthshine.
A waxing crescent Moon should
also create some lovely western skies at dusk
this
weekend.
The bright star in the sky near tonight's (Saturday's) Moon will
actually be the planet Mars.
On Sunday the Moon will move closer to a pair of celestial
beacons, bright star Regulus
and Saturn.
APOD: 2008 May 31 - A View to the Sunset
Explanation:
Each day on planet Earth
can have a dramatic ending as the
Sun sets
below the
colorful
western horizon.
Often inspiring, or offering a moment for contemplation,
a sunset is perhaps the single most
photographed celestial
event.
Did you recognize this as a picture of one?
The image actually is a single exposure of the setting Sun
recorded near Wasserberg, Germany on May 11.
To create the uncommon sunset view the photographer used a
digital camera and a zoom lens (a lens with an adjustable
focal length).
During the 1/6 second long exposure he smoothly changed the
focal length while simultaneously rotating the camera,
altering the image scale and orientation.
The result transforms an objective depiction of nature
into an artistic
abstraction.
APOD: 2008 May 26 - A New Horizon for Phoenix
Explanation:
This
flat horizon stretches across the red planet as seen by the Phoenix
spacecraft after yesterday's landing on Mars.
Touching
down shortly after 7:30pm Eastern Time, Phoenix made
the first successful
soft landing on Mars, using rockets to control its final speed, since the
Viking
landers in 1976.
Launched in August of 2007,
Phoenix has now made the northernmost landing
and is intended to explore the Martian arctic's potentially
ice-rich soil.
The lander has
returned
images and data initially indicating
that it is in excellent shape after a nearly
flawless descent.
News
updates will be available throughout the day.
APOD: 2008 May 16 - Circles in the Sky
Explanation:
Gazing skyward on a sunny day in May,
photographer Jean-Marc Lecleire captured this
engaging display
of ice halos
forming complete circles in the sky.
Recorded with a fish-eye lens from a spot near
the grand
Château de Chambord in France,
the picture looks
straight up, spanning almost 180 degrees from
horizon to horizon.
Surrounding the Sun is a halo
formed by sunlight refracting through
hexagonal-shaped ice crystals in
high, thin clouds.
The halo is circular and exactly 22 degrees in radius,
but it looks squashed because of the
distortion
of the extremely wide-angle lens.
Surrounding the zenith (the point directly above the observer)
and always at the same altitude as the
Sun is a lovely
parhelic circle,
caused by sunlight
reflecting from ice crystals with nearly vertical faces.
On average more common than rainbows,
beautiful ice halos can often be seen in planet Earth's sky
by those who know
how to look
for them.
APOD: 2008 May 9 - Moon Meets Mercury
Explanation:
On Tuesday, May 6, while standing on
planet Earth
and sweeping your binoculars along the western horizon just
after sunset,
you might have encountered this arresting skyscape.
The view features a slender crescent Moon and
bright planet Mercury separated on the sky by only
about 2 degrees.
Cradled in the
sunlit lunar crescent, the night
side of the Moon is faintly illuminated by earthshine --
sunlight reflected from planet Earth.
Of course, the clouds in silhouette and fading twilight colors
are common elements in pictures of the sky after sunset,
but much less often seen is inner planet Mercury,
usually hiding
close to the Sun in Earth's sky.
Still, the coming week will be a
good
time to
spot Mercury near the western horizon
about 30 minutes after sunset.
As for the Moon,
tonight and
tomorrow
night the crescent Moon will wander close to Mars
in the early evening sky.
APOD: 2008 May 7 - The Gegenschein Over Chile
Explanation:
Is the night sky darkest in the direction opposite the Sun?
No. In fact, a rarely discernable faint glow known as
the gegenschein (German for "counter glow") can be seen 180
degrees around from the Sun in an extremely dark sky.
The gegenschein is sunlight back-scattered off small interplanetary
dust particles.
These dust particles are millimeter sized splinters from
asteroids and orbit in the
ecliptic plane of the planets.
Pictured above from last October is one of the most spectacular pictures of
the gegenschein yet taken.
Here a deep exposure of an extremely dark sky over
Paranal Observatory in
Chile shows
the gegenschein so clearly that even a surrounding glow is visible.
In the foreground are several of the
European Southern Observatory's
Very Large Telescopes,
while notable background objects include the
Andromeda galaxy toward the lower left and the
Pleiades star cluster just above the horizon.
The gegenschein
is distinguished from zodiacal light near the Sun by the
high angle of reflection.
During the day, a phenomenon similar to
the gegenschein called the glory can
be seen in reflecting air or clouds opposite the Sun from an airplane.
APOD: 2008 May 3 - Alborz Mountain Milky Way
Explanation:
Snow-capped stratovolcano
Mt. Damavand climbs to 5,670 meters
(18,598 feet) near the left edge in this panoramic view of
the world at
night.
In the sky to the left of Damavand's peak are the stars of the
Big Dipper in Ursa Major.
Pan to the right and your gaze will sweep across the arch of
our Milky Way Galaxy above the
Alborz Mountain Range
bordering the Caspian Sea.
Near the center of the panorama, recorded in the predawn
hours of April 4th, bright stars
Deneb and
Altair
lie close to the curve of the Milky Way, above the glow of
the Haraz valley.
Farther right, brilliant Jupiter dominates the sky
near the stars, nebulae, and dark dust clouds toward the
bulging galactic center.
Finally, the horizon glow at the right edge,
below bright yellowish giant star
Antares,
is from the city of Damavand, named for the legendary
mountain peak.
APOD: 2008 April 15 - Sky Delights Over Sweden
Explanation:
This night was a
sky enthusiast's delight.
While relaxing in
Sweden
last week, many a cosmic wonder was captured with a single snapshot.
They are described here from near to far.
In the foreground are nearby
trees
and more distant
snow covered mountains.
In silhouette,
Clouds can be seen just above the horizon,
and a careful eye can even discern the more distant green and red
auroras
which occur in Earth's upper atmosphere.
Red emission nebulas dot the sky,
including the
Heart and Soul Nebulas,
IC 1396 and the
North America Nebula.
Running diagonally from the upper left to the lower right is the
majestic glowing band of our
Milky Way Galaxy's central plane..
More distant than everything else, appearing as it did over
two million years ago, is the Andromeda galaxy,
visible above the horizon toward on the lower left.
APOD: 2008 February 28 - ISS: Sunlight to Shadow
Explanation:
Orbiting 400,000 kilometers above the Earth, the
Moon slid
into Earth's shadow to begin last week's total lunar
eclipse.
Of course the
International Space Station (ISS) slides into
Earth's shadow every 90 minutes, the time it takes it to complete one
orbit at
an altitude of about 400 kilometers.
Recorded near sunset on February 7,
looking toward the north,
this
composite of 70 exposures shows the trail of the
ISS (with gaps between exposures) as it moved left to right
over the city of Tübingen in southern Germany.
Beginning
in sunlight on the left, the ISS vanishes as it enters
Earth's shadow at the far right, above the northeastern horizon.
As seen from Tübingen, the passage took about 4 minutes.
Clicking on the image will download a
time-lapse animation
(mpg file) based on the individual exposures that includes a plane flying
along
the horizon.
APOD: 2008 February 16 - Large Binocular Telescope
Explanation:
With moonlight on the horizon, a starry sky
and the northern Milky Way
provide the background for
this
dramatic view of the
World at Night.
The imposing structure in the foreground houses the
Large Binocular Telescope
(LBT), on Mount Graham, Arizona.
Inside,
the two 8.4 meter diameter mirrors of the LBT really are
side-by-side on a common mount, an
arrangement
mimicking the design of more modest optical equipment usually
carried around the neck.
While not exactly portable,
the benefits of the large scale binocular configuration adopted
include an increase in sensitivity over a single mirror telescope
and high resolution imaging for faint objects over a relatively
wide field of view.
An international collaboration operates the
LBT Observatory.
APOD: 2008 January 27 - Mercury on the Horizon
Explanation:
Have you ever seen the planet Mercury?
Because
Mercury orbits so close to the Sun,
it never wanders far from the Sun in
Earth's sky.
If trailing the Sun,
Mercury will be visible
low on the horizon for only a short while
after sunset.
If leading the Sun, Mercury
will be visible only shortly before
sunrise.
So at certain times of the year an
informed skygazer with a little determination
can usually pick Mercury
out from a site with an unobscured horizon.
Above, a lot of determination has been combined
with a little
digital trickery to
show Mercury's successive positions during March of 2000.
Each picture was taken from the same location in Spain
when the Sun itself was 10 degrees below the
horizon and superposed
on the single most
photogenic sunset.
Mercury is
currently visible in the western sky
after sunset, but will disappear in the Sun's glare after a few days.
APOD: 2008 January 23 - Orbiting Astronaut Reflects Earth
Explanation:
Astronaut
self-portraits can be particularly interesting.
Visible in the
above picture,
working in from the outer borders,
are the edges of the reflecting helmet of a
space suit,
modules of the
International Space Station (ISS), the
Earth, the arms of
Expedition 15 astronaut
Clay Anderson,
and the digital camera used to snap the image.
This picture was taken during the
shuttle
orbiter Endeavour's
mission to expand the space station last August.
The large curvature of the Earth appearing in the visor
reflection is not the true
curvature of our spherical Earth, but rather an artifact of the
curve of the space helmet.
Earth's horizon appears only slightly curved
when viewed from the height of the ISS -- approximately 400 kilometers.
The next space shuttle mission
to the space station is currently expected to take place next month and
includes the installation of the scientific
Columbus
Laboratory.
APOD: 2008 January 21 - Mercury's Horizon from MESSENGER
Explanation:
What would it look like to fly past Mercury?
Just such an adventure was experienced last week by the MESSENGER spacecraft during its
first flyby of the strange
moon-like world nearest the Sun.
Pictured above is the limb of
Mercury
seen by MESSENGER
upon approach, from about 1 1/2
Earth diameters away.
Visible on the hot and barren planet are many
craters, many appeared to be more shallow than similarly sized craters on the Moon.
The comparatively high
gravity of
Mercury helps
flatten
tall structures like high crater walls.
MESSENGER
was able to take over 1,000 images of Mercury which will be beamed back to
Earth for
planetary geologists
to study.
The robotic MESSENGER spacecraft is
scheduled to fly past Mercury twice more before firing its thrusters
to enter orbit in 2011.
APOD: 2008 January 12 - Mercury Chases the Sunset
Explanation:
This colorful view of the western sky at sunset features
last Wednesday's slender crescent Moon.
Of course, when the Moon is in its
crescent phase it can
never be far from the Sun in the sky.
Also always close to the Sun in Earth's sky
is innermost
planet
Mercury, seen here below and right of center
against the bright orange glow along the horizon.
Mercury is usually
difficult
to glimpse because
of overwhelming sunlight, but increasingly better views of
the small planet after sunset will be possible as
it wanders farther
east of the Sun in the coming days.
On January 14th, NASA's MESSENGER
spacecraft will have a
good view
too, as it makes
its first Mercury flyby.
APOD: 2008 January 1 - Rays from an Unexpected Aurora
Explanation:
This aurora was a bit of a surprise.
For starters, on this day in 2002, no intense
auroral activity was
expected at all.
Possibly more surprising, however, the
aurora appeared to show an usual structure of green
rays
from some locations.
In
this view, captured from
North Dakota,
USA, a picket fence of green rays stretches toward
the horizon.
Mirroring the green rays is a
red band, somewhat rare in its own right.
Lights from the cities of Bismarck and
Mandan are visible near the horizon.
APOD: 2007 December 22 - Tyrrhenian Sea and Solstice Sky
Explanation:
Today the Solstice occurs at 0608
Universal Time,
the Sun reaching its southernmost declination in planet
Earth's sky.
Of course, the
December
Solstice marks
the beginning of
winter
in the northern hemisphere and summer in the south.
When viewed from northern latitudes, the Sun will
make its lowest arc through the sky along the southern horizon.
So in the north, the Solstice day has the shortest length of time between
sunrise and sunset and fewest hours of daylight.
This striking composite
image follows the Sun's path through
the December Solstice day of 2005 in a beautiful blue
sky, looking down the
Tyrrhenian Sea
coast from Santa Severa toward Fiumicino, Italy.
The view covers about 115 degrees in 43 separate, well-planned
exposures from sunrise to sunset.
APOD: 2007 December 21 - Horizon to Horizon
Explanation:
Scroll right and journey from horizon to horizon as your gaze sweeps
through
the zenith in
the night
sky over Beg-Meil, France.
Recorded on December 13th,
the entertaining panorama
(image key)
covers 210 degrees
in 21 separate exposures, beginning on the beach with bright star
Sirius rising in the southeast.
Look up (pan right) to encounter the nebula rich constellation
of Orion and
continue on to find the lovely Pleiades
star cluster.
Farther along, higher in the sky, is the famous
Comet Holmes,
still
gracing the northern hemisphere's night with its
remarkable expanding coma.
Finally, just before diving into the
urban glow from city lights along
the northwestern horizon (far right), check out the
double star cluster in
Perseus and take in the cosmic streak of a bright
Geminid
Meteor.
APOD: 2007 October 11 - Bright Planets, Crescent Moon
Explanation:
Early risers are currently enjoying
the sight of
dazzling Venus,
near the eastern horizon as the
morning star.
Recorded on October 7, this predawn
skyview
does feature Venus at the upper right.
It also includes a crescent Moon and Saturn (lower left).
In fact, holding your fist at arms length would have
easily covered
both planets and the Moon in this 5 degree wide field.
Earthshine,
sunlight reflected from planet Earth's dayside, illuminates
features on the lunar nightside.
A close inspection of Saturn itself reveals
a nearby pinpoint of light corresponding
to
Saturn's large moon Titan.
Though the Moon has moved on,
the tight triangle formed by Venus, Saturn,
and Regulus (top), alpha star in the constellation Leo, will
continue to look impressive
in early morning skies over the next few days.
Early bird astrophotographer Jay Ouellet also described
Mars as a "brilliant red diode" in
his dark country sky east of Quebec City, Canada.
APOD: 2007 September 25 - Zodiacal Light and the False Dawn
Explanation:
An unusual triangle of light will be particularly bright near the eastern horizon before sunrise
during the next two months for observers in Earth's northern hemisphere.
Once considered a false dawn, this triangle of light is actually
Zodiacal Light, light reflected from
interplanetary dust particles.
The triangle is clearly visible toward the left of the frame taken from the
Paranal
Observatory in Chile
in July.
Zodiacal dust
orbits the Sun
predominantly in the same plane as the planets: the
ecliptic.
Zodiacal light is so bright this time of year because the
dust band is oriented
nearly vertical at sunrise,
so that the thick air near the horizon does not block
out relatively bright reflecting dust.
Zodiacal light is also bright for
people in Earth's northern hemisphere in March and April just after sunset.
APOD: 2007 July 9 - The Most Distant Sun
Explanation:
When is the Sun most distant from Earth?
It happened again
just this past weekend.
A common misconception is that the Sun is most distant during
the winter, when it's the coldest.
In truth, however, the
seasonal temperatures
are more
greatly
influenced
by the number of daylight hours and how high the Sun rises.
For example, during northern winter, the tilt of the Earth causes the
Sun to be above the horizon for a
shorter time and remain lower in the sky than in northern summer.
The picture
compares the
relative size of the Sun during Earth's closest approach in
January (northern winter) on the left,
and in July (northern summer) on the right.
The angular size of the Sun is
noticeably smaller during July, when it is farther away.
If the Earth's orbit
was perfectly circular,
the Sun would always appear to be the same size.
These two solar images
were taken from
Spain during 2006,
but the same effect can be seen in any year from any
Earth-bound location.
APOD: 2007 July 4 - Red, White, and Blue Sky
Explanation:
Contrasting colors in this
beautiful sunset sky
were captured on June 30 from
Clear Creek Canyon Observatory in central Arizona, USA.
The twilight scene includes
brilliant Venus as the
evening
star, with a bright Saturn just above it,
shining through thin clouds.
The two wandering
planets were
a mere 1 degree apart or so,
about twice the width of the full Moon rising above the
eastern horizon on the other side of the sky.
In fact, such serene
skyviews were possible from
all over planet Earth as Venus and Saturn approached a
conjunction.
Regulus, alpha star of the
constellation
Leo, is above and to the left of the close planetary pairing.
At dusk, lights in tonight's sky will also feature
Venus and Saturn low in the west and separated by
about 2 degrees.
APOD: 2007 June 3 - Shuttle Plume Shadow Points to Moon
Explanation:
Why would the shadow of a
space shuttle
launch plume point toward the Moon?
In early 2001 during a launch of
Atlantis,
the Sun,
Earth,
Moon,
and rocket were all properly aligned for
this
photogenic coincidence.
First, for the
space shuttle's plume to cast a long shadow,
the time of day must be either near
sunrise or
sunset.
Next, just at sunset, the
shadow
is the longest and extends all the way to the
horizon.
Finally, during a
Full Moon, the
Sun and
Moon are on
opposite sides of the sky.
Just after
sunset, for example, the Sun is slightly below the
horizon, and,
in the other direction, the Moon is slightly above the horizon.
Therefore, as
Atlantis blasted off, just after
sunset,
its shadow projected away from the Sun
toward the opposite horizon, where the
Full Moon just happened to be.
APOD: 2007 April 4 - New Horizons at Io
Explanation:
Spewed from
a volcano,
a complex plume rises over
300 kilometers above the horizon of Jupiter's moon Io
in this image from cameras onboard the
New Horizons
spacecraft.
The volcano,
Tvashtar, is marked by the bright
glow (about 1 o'clock)
at the moon's edge, beyond the terminator or night/day shadow line.
The shadow of Io cuts across the plume itself.
Also capturing stunning details on the dayside surface, the
high resolution image was recorded when the
spacecraft was 2.3 million kilometers from Io.
Later it was combined with lower resolution
color data
by astro-imager Sean Walker to produce this
sharp portrait of the solar system's
most active moon.
Outward bound at almost 23 kilometers per second,
the New Horizons spacecraft should cross the orbit of Saturn in
June next year, and is ultimately
destined to encounter
Pluto in 2015.
APOD: 2007 March 30 - Three Galaxies and a Comet
Explanation:
Diffuse starlight and dark nebulae
along the southern
Milky Way
arc over the horizon and sprawl diagonally through this
gorgeous nightscape.
The breath-taking mosaic spans a wide
100 degrees, with the rugged
terrain
of the Patagonia, Argentina region in the foreground.
Along with the insider's view of our own galaxy, the image
features our outside perspective on two irregular satellite galaxies -
the Large and
Small Magellanic Clouds.
Recorded on January 28, the scene also captures the
broad tail
and bright coma of Comet McNaught, The
Great Comet of 2007.
APOD: 2007 March 23 - Touran Sunrise
Explanation:
Clouds covered the eastern horizon on Monday, when the
Sun rose over the expansive
Touran Wildlife Reserve in
northeastern Iran.
Of course, on that day the Moon rose
with the Sun, creating a
widely enjoyed partial solar
eclipse.
Along with a mountainous
horizon, the cloud cover lent a
dramatic aspect
to this eclipse sunrise and made
it possible for astronomer Babak Tafreshi to record these
telephoto images without using a filter.
Advancing
north in planet Earth's sky, the Sun itself was also
approaching the equinox, the astronomical marker
for the first day of northern hemisphere spring
and the beginning of
Norouz, the Persian
New Year.
APOD: 2007 March 22 - Goa Silhouettes
Explanation:
On Moonday, March 19,
shortly before the
equinox,
locations in Asia and the Arctic
were
favoured by the New Moon's
shadow during a partial
solar eclipse.
Although the view from
Goa, India
found the eclipsed Sun near the horizon, photographer
Joerg Schoppmeyer was still able to capture this lovely
image, combining celestial with terrestrial silhouettes.
The next eclipse season will begin in
late August
this year,
featuring a total lunar eclipse on August 28, and another
partial solar eclipse on September 11.
Compared to the March 19th eclipse, the September 11th eclipse will
be seen on the other side of
our fair planet, from parts
of South America and
Antarctica.
APOD: 2007 March 20 - A Blue Crescent Moon from Space
Explanation:
What's happening to the Moon?
Drifting around the Earth in 2006 July, astronauts from the
International Space Station (ISS) captured a
crescent Moon floating far beyond the horizon.
The captured above image is interesting because part of the
Moon appears blue,
and because part of the moon appears missing.
Both effects are created by the
Earth's atmosphere.
Air molecules
more efficiently scatter increasingly blue light, making the clear
day sky blue for ground observers, and the horizon blue for astronauts.
Besides reflecting sunlight, these
atmospheric molecules
also deflect moonlight, making the lower part of the moon appear to fade away.
As one looks higher in the
photograph, the increasingly thin atmosphere appears to
fade to black.
APOD: 2007 January 24 - A Comet Tail Horizon
Explanation:
What's happening over the horizon?
Many a sky enthusiast who thought they had
seen it all had never seen anything like this.
To the surprise of many Northern Hemisphere observers, the tail of
Comet McNaught
remained visible even after the comet's head set ahead of the Sun.
What's more, visible were bright but extremely rare
filamentary striae from the comet's expansive dust tail.
The cause of dust tail striae are not known for sure, but are possibly related to
fragmentation
of comet's nucleus.
The last comet to show
prominent striae was
Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997.
Pictured above, the tail of
Comet McNaught was caught just after sunset last Friday
above the
Carnic Alps of northern
Italy.
APOD: 2007 January 9 - McNaught Now Brightest Comet in Decades
Explanation:
The brightest comet
in decades
is unexpectedly
now
visible.
The most optimistic predictions have
Comet
McNaught (C/2006 P1) shortly becoming
one of the brightest comets of the past century.
For the next few days, its short tail and bright coma
can be spotted with the unaided eye
close to the Sun and
near the horizon in both
evening and
morning skies.
This dramatic
picture
of the comet shining through
cloudy skies was
taken near sunset on January 7 from Bad Mergentheim, Germany.
APOD: 2007 January 5 - Comet McNaught Heads for the Sun
Explanation:
Early morning risers with a clear and unobstructed eastern horizon
can enjoy the
sight
of Comet McNaught (C/2006 P1)
in dawn skies over the next few days.
Discovered in August by R. H. McNaught
(Siding Spring Survey)
the comet has grown bright enough to see with the unaided
eye but will soon be lost in the glare of the Sun.
Still, by January 11 sun-staring spacecraft SOHO should be able to
offer web-based views as the
comet
heads toward a perihelion
passage inside the orbit of Mercury.
This
image captures the new naked-eye
comet
at about 2nd
magnitude
in twilight skies near sunset on January 3rd.
After rounding the Sun
and emerging from the solar glare later this month,
Comet
McNaught could be even brighter.
APOD: 2006 October 19 - SWAN Meets Galaxy
Explanation:
This
cosmic portrait recorded October 9th features
the lovely blue-green
coma
of Comet SWAN posing
with spiral galaxy
NGC 5005 in the
northern constellation
Canes Venatici.
At the time the comet (center) was in the close
foreground, a mere 9 light-minutes from planet Earth,
with the galaxy a more substantial 60 million light-years distant.
Not actually related to a bird, Comet SWAN
(C/2006 M4)
was so named as it was first spotted in image data from the
SWAN (Solar Wind ANisotropies) camera aboard the
sun-staring SOHO spacecraft.
Having rounded the Sun,
this comet is headed for interstellar space, but first it will make
its closest approach to Earth on October 24.
With binoculars, northern hemisphere observers can now
spot
the comet above the northwestern horizon,
near the handle of the Big Dipper in the
early evening sky.
APOD: 2006 October 17 - Clouds and Sand on the Horizon of Mars
Explanation:
If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see?
Like the
robotic Opportunity rover
rolling across the red planet,
you might well see vast plains of
red sand,
an orange tinted sky, and wispy light clouds.
The Opportunity rover captured just such a vista after arriving at Victoria Crater earlier this month, albeit in a completely
different direction from the large crater.
Unlike other Martian vistas,
few rocks are visible in
this exaggerated color
image mosaic.
The distant red horizon is so flat and
featureless that it appears similar to the horizon toward a calm blue ocean on Earth.
Clouds on Mars
can be composed of either
carbon dioxide ice or
water ice, and can move quickly,
like clouds move on Earth.
The red dust in the Martian air can change the
sky color above Mars from the
blue that occurs above Earth toward the red, with the
exact color depending on the density and particle size of the floating dust particles.
APOD: 2006 September 30 - STS 115: Stereo Portrait
Explanation:
On September 12, astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper
snapped photos of her colleague Joseph Tanner during the
STS-115 mission.
At the time, the spacesuited pair were working outside the shuttle
orbiter Atlantis, some 300 kilometers
above planet Earth.
Portions of two of the pictures
(S115-E-05750 and
S115-E-05753)
have been combined in this spectacular 3D image - a stereo
anaglyph intended to be viewed with
red/blue
glasses.
Included in the scene
reflected in Tanner's visor is
Stefanyshyn-Piper herself and the Sun shining above
the Earth's distant horizon.
APOD: 2006 September 17 - Anticrepuscular Rays Over Florida
Explanation:
What's happening over the horizon?
Although the scene may appear somehow
supernatural,
nothing more unusual is occurring than a
setting Sun and some well placed clouds.
Strangely, the actual sunset was occurring in the opposite direction from where the camera was pointing.
Pictured above are
anticrepuscular rays.
To understand them, start by picturing common
crepuscular rays that are seen any time that sunlight pours though scattered clouds.
Now although sunlight indeed travels along
straight lines, the projections of these lines onto the
spherical sky are
great circles.
Therefore, the
crepuscular rays from a
setting (or rising) sun
will appear to re-converge on the other side of the sky.
At the anti-solar point 180 degrees around from the
Sun, they are referred to as
anticrepuscular rays.
While enjoying the sunset after visiting NASA's
Kennedy Space Center in
Florida,
the photographer chanced to find that an even
more spectacular sight was occurring in the other direction just over the
Atlantic Ocean -- a particularly vivid set of
anticrepuscular rays.
APOD: 2006 September 6 - Green Aurora Over Lake Superior
Explanation:
What if your horizon was green?
If you've got a camera, take a picture!
That was the experience of Jeff Hapeman last week when visiting the
Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in
Michigan.
On a quiet night toward the northern horizon over
Lake Superior
was a long lasting diffuse
green aurora.
The above image was taken in an effort to capture the
sense of wonder one gets when watching an auroral display.
Auroras
are sparked by
energetic particles from the
Sun impacting the
magnetic environment
around the Earth.
Resultant energetic particles such as
electrons and
protons
rain down near the Earth's poles and impact the air.
The impacted
air molecules
temporarily lose electrons, and when
oxygen molecules
among them reacquire these electrons, they emit
green light.
Auroras
are known to have many
shapes and
colors.
APOD: 2006 July 24 - The International Space Station on the Horizon
Explanation:
This was home.
Last week, the
STS-121 crew of the
Space Shuttle
Discovery undocked from the
International Space Station (ISS) and returned to Earth.
As the shuttle departed the space station, they took the
above image.
Visible on the ISS are numerous
modules, trusses, and long wing-like solar panels.
The space shuttle crew spent over 12 days calling the space station home.
The shuttle crew
resupplied the space station and prepared it for future assembly.
The ISS's crew
of two was expanded to three by the
shuttle visit, and now includes
one Russian,
one American, and
one European.
APOD: 2006 July 23 - The Belt of Venus over the Valley of the Moon
Explanation:
Although you've surely seen it, you might not have noticed it.
During a cloudless twilight, just before
sunrise or after
sunset,
part of the atmosphere above the horizon appears
slightly off-color, slightly pink.
Called the Belt of Venus, this off-color band between the dark
eclipsed sky and the
blue sky can be seen in nearly every direction
including that opposite the Sun.
Straight above, blue sky is normal sunlight reflecting off the atmosphere.
In the Belt of Venus, however, the
atmosphere reflects light from the setting (or rising)
Sun which appears more red.
The Belt of Venus can be seen from any location with a
clear horizon.
Pictured above, the Belt of Venus was photographed above
morning fog in the
Valley of the Moon, a famous wine-producing region in northern
California,
USA.
The belt is
frequently
caught
by
accident
in
other
photographs.
APOD: 2006 July 20 - Constellation Construction
Explanation:
This lovely
twilight scene, recorded last April,
finds a young crescent Moon
low in the west at sunset.
Above it, stars shine in the darkening sky
but they too are soon to drop below the western horizon.
These stars and constellations are prominent in the northern
hemisphere winter sky and as
the season changes, slowly give way to the
stars of summer.
Sliding your mouse over the picture will detail the
constellations and stars in view,
including Orion, Gemini, Auriga, Perseus,
and the Hyades and Pleiades star clusters.
APOD: 2006 July 19 - Reflections on Planet Earth
Explanation:
Catching sight of
your reflection in
a store window or shiny hubcap can be
entertaining and occasionally even inspire a thoughtful moment.
So consider this reflective view
from 300 kilometers above planet Earth.
The picture is actually a self-portrait
taken by astronaut
Michael Fossum on July 8 during a space walk or extravehicular
activity while the
Discovery orbiter was docked with the
International Space Station.
Turning his camera to snap a picture of his own helmet visor,
he also recorded the reflection of his fellow
mission specialist,
Piers Sellers, near picture center and one of the space station's
gold-tinted solar power arrays arcing across the top.
Of course, the horizon of
our
fair planet lies in background.
APOD: 2006 June 29 - Old Moon and Sister Stars
Explanation:
An old crescent Moon shares the
eastern sky over
Menton, France
with the sister stars
of the Pleiades cluster in this early
morning skyscape
recorded just last Friday, June 23rd.
(Bright Venus was also near the eastern horizon, but
is not pictured here.)
Astronomical images of the
well-known Pleiades often show the
cluster's alluring blue reflection nebulae, but they are washed out here
by the bright moonlight.
Still, while the
crescent Moon is overexposed,
surface features can be seen on the dim lunar night
side illuminated by earthshine - light from sunlit planet
Earth.
Of course, you can spot a young
crescent Moon in the early evening
sky tonight.
Having left the Pleiades behind, a lovely lunar crescent now
appears in the west,
lining up with planets Mars, Saturn,
and Mercury along the solar system's
ecliptic plane.
APOD: 2006 June 15 - Gordel van Venus
Explanation:
Scroll right and
enjoy this 180 degree panorama across the
South African Astronomical
Observatory's hilltop
Sutherland observing station.
Featured are
SAAO
telescope domes and buildings, along
with the dark, wedge-shaped shadow of planet Earth stretching into
the distance, bounded above by the delicately
colored antitwilight arch.
Visible along the antisunward horizon
at sunset,
(or sunrise)
the pinkish
antitwilight arch
is also known as the Belt of Venus.
In order, the significant structures from left to right house;
the giant SALT 11-meter instrument,
the internet telescope
MONET,
the 1.9 meter Radcliffe,
the 1.0 meter Elizabeth,
a 0.75 meter reflector,
a 0.5 meter reflector,
a garage,
YSTAR,
BiSON,
ACT,
IRSF (open),
and a storage building.
(Note to SAAO fans: in this east-facing view the planet-hunter
SuperWASP south
is hidden behind the IRSF.)
APOD: 2006 June 11 - Sunspot Loops in Ultraviolet
Explanation:
It was a quiet day on the
Sun.
The above image shows, however, that even during off days the
Sun's surface is a busy place.
Shown in ultraviolet light, the relatively
cool dark regions have temperatures of thousands of degrees
Celsius.
Large sunspot group AR 9169 is
visible as the bright area near the horizon.
The bright glowing gas flowing around the
sunspots
has a temperature of over one million degrees
Celsius.
The reason for the high temperatures is
unknown
but thought to be related to the rapidly changing
magnetic field loops that channel solar plasma.
Sunspot group AR 9169 moved across the
Sun during 2000 September and decayed in a few weeks.
APOD: 2006 June 10 - Moon Over Haleakala
Explanation:
A waxing
crescent Moon shines over the caldera of
dormant
volcano
Haleakala and
observatory domes
in this dramatic view from above the clouds.
Looking west from Maui,
Hawaii on May 31st, the scene also records the lights of Honolulu
on the horizon.
Near the strongly overexposed crescent is bright planet Saturn,
but included in the skyscape are planet Mars and the
Gemini
stars Castor and Pollux.
Of course, skywatchers also found star cluster
M44, The Beehive Cluster,
in this early evening sky, wedged between
Saturn and the Moon.
In fact, as it closes with Saturn, Mars will pass
in front of the Beehive on June 15, so just
keep looking west.
(Can't find all the players?
Click here
for help.)
APOD: 2006 April 8 - Vanishing Umbra
Explanation:
During the
March 29
total solar eclipse, the Moon's
dark central shadow
or umbra is vanishing beyond
the horizon in this
dramatic view
of the landscape
a few kilometers southeast of Incesu, Anatolia, Turkey.
The large, snow covered mountain in the distance
is 3,250 meter high
volcano
Hasan Dag.
The foreground is growing brighter as eclipse watchers are just
beginning to see rays of sunlight peek
around
the lunar limb, while the mountains on the horizon,
left of Hasan Dag, are still completely
shadowed by the Moon.
For the watchers along this part of the
shadow track, the
total phase of the eclipse lasted less than 4 minutes as
the umbra raced
over them at more than 3,000 kilometers per hour.
APOD: 2006 February 4 - Shadow Set
Explanation:
A nearly full Moon
and planet Earth's shadow
set together in this scene
captured on January 13th from snowy Mt. Jelm, home of the
Wyoming Infrared Observatory.
For early morning risers (and late to bed
astronomers),
shadow set in the western sky is a
daily
apparition whose subtle beauty
is often overlooked in
favor of the more colorful eastern horizon.
Extending through the dense atmosphere,
Earth's setting shadow is seen
in this picture as a dark blue band along the distant horizon,
bounded above
by a pinkish glow or antitwilight arch.
Known as the Belt of Venus, the arch's
lovely color is due to
backscattering of reddened light from the rising Sun.
The setting Moon's light is
also reddened
by the long sight-line through the atmosphere.
APOD: 2006 February 1 - Venus Just After Sunset
Explanation:
Is that Venus or an airplane?
A common ponderable for
sky enthusiasts is deciding if that bright spot
near the horizon is the planet
Venus.
Usually, an airplane will show itself by moving significantly in a few moments.
Venus will set only slowly as the
Earth turns.
Still, the identification would be easier if Venus did not keep
shifting its position each night.
Pictured above,
Venus was captured 38 different nights during 2005 and 2006 over
Bursa,
Turkey, when
Earth's sister planet appeared exclusively in the evening sky.
The average spacing of the images was about five days, while the images
were always taken with the Sun about 7 degrees below the horizon.
Venus' orbit
around the Sun will now confine it to Earth's
morning sky until October 2006.
APOD: 2006 January 21 - Apollo 12: Self-Portrait
Explanation:
In November of 1969,
Apollo 12 astronaut-photographer
Charles "Pete" Conrad recorded
this masterpiece while documenting colleague
Alan Bean's
lunar soil collection activities on the
Oceanus Procellarum.
The image is dramatic and stark.
The harsh environment of the Moon's Ocean of Storms is
echoed in Bean's helmet, a perfectly
composed
reflection of Conrad and
the
lunar horizon.
Is it art?
Works of photojournalists originally
intent on recording the human condition on planet Earth,
such as Lewis W. Hine's images from New York City
in the early 20th century, or
Margaret
Bourke-White's magazine photography are widely
regarded as art.
Similarly many documentary astronomy and
space images
can be appreciated for their artistic and
esthetic appeal.
APOD: 2005 December 24 - Earthrise
Explanation:
In December of 1968, the
Apollo 8 crew flew from the
Earth to the
Moon and back again.
Frank Borman,
James Lovell, and
William Anders were launched atop a
Saturn
V rocket on December 21,
circled the Moon ten times in their command module,
and returned to Earth on December 27.
The Apollo 8 mission's impressive
list of firsts includes: the first humans to journey to the
Earth's Moon, the first manned flight using the
Saturn V,
and the first to photograph
the Earth from deep space.
As the Apollo 8 command module rounded the farside of the Moon,
the crew could look toward the
lunar horizon and see the Earth appear
to rise, due to their spacecraft's orbital motion.
The famous
picture that resulted, of a distant
blue Earth above the
Moon's limb, was a marvelous gift to the world.
APOD: 2005 December 9 - December Moon Meets Evening Star
Explanation:
If you've been outdoors near sunset, then you've probably
noticed Venus low in the west as the
brilliant evening star.
Sometimes mistaken for a tower light
near the horizon,
Venus is the third brightest celestial beacon, after
the Sun and Moon, in planet Earth's sky.
That distinction is particularly easy to appreciate in
this
peaceful scene featuring the crescent Moon, Venus, and
sunset colors captured on
December 4th near Albany, Missouri, USA.
As this season's evening star,
Venus
will be at its most brilliant
tonight, but as December progresses the bright
planet will begin to
fall out of the western sky.
By early next week, December's Moon will have moved on to meet
another bright planet overhead -- Mars.
APOD: 2005 November 25 - Moon Over Antarctica
Explanation:
Last week, the nearly Full Moon set along the northern
horizon - as seen from
Davis
Station,
Antarctica.
The squashed orange pumpkin shape just silhouettes
the peak of a distant iceberg in this stunning view.
The Moon's apparently
squashed shape is due to atmospheric
bending of light or
refraction - an effect which
is more severe closer to the horizon.
Skimming low along the stark features of the frozen landscape, the
Moon's
lower edge appears noticeably more distorted
than the upper limb.
Along with about 70 others present at Davis Station,
Dr. Jim Behrens had a chance to
enjoy the view
while studying the
ongoing detachment
of a large iceberg known as "Loose Tooth".
APOD: 2005 November 20 - Rays from an Unexpected Aurora
Explanation:
This aurora was a bit of a surprise.
For starters, on this Friday morning in August 2002, no intense
auroral activity was expected at all.
Possibly more surprising, however, the
aurora appeared to show an usual structure of green
rays from some locations.
In the above image, captured from
North Dakota,
USA, a picket fence of green rays stretches toward the horizon.
Mirroring the green rays is a
red band, somewhat rare in its own right.
Lights from the cities of
Bismarck and Mandan are visible near the horizon.
Large sunspot groups indicate that activity from an
active Sun
is relatively likely, possibly causing
other streams of
energetic particles to cascade onto the Earth
and so causing more
auroras.
APOD: 2005 November 15 - A Taurid Meteor Fireball
Explanation:
Have you ever seen a very bright meteor?
Unexpected, this year's
Taurid meteor shower resulted in
numerous reports of very
bright fireballs during the nights surrounding
Halloween.
Pictured above, a fireball that momentarily rivaled the brightness of the
full Moon was caught over
Cerro Pachon,
Chile by a
continuous sky monitor on November 1.
Several bright Taurid fireballs are identifiable on the
sky movie for that night.
The above image is a digitally rectangled version of a circular
fisheye frame
and shows the entire sky, horizon to horizon.
The bright meteor was seen swooping between the directions of the
Large and
Small Magellanic Clouds.
The band of the
Milky Way Galaxy
crosses the horizon behind the dome of the 8-meter
Gemini South Telescope.
Taurid meteor fireballs are
likely pebble sized debris left by
Comet Encke.
Over the next week the
Leonids meteor shower will peak, although they will need to be seen through the glare of a nearly full Moon.
[Disclosure: Robert Nemiroff collaborates on both the
Astronomy Picture of the Day and the Night Sky Live projects.]
APOD: 2005 October 31 - A Martian Halloween
Explanation:
From sunset to sunrise, an unusually bright yellowish
orb will hang in the sky this Halloween: Mars.
Yesterday,
Earth passed Mars
as they orbited the Sun, bringing
Mars
closer than it will be for the next thirteen years.
Tonight though, Mars will be nearly as bright as last night,
a beacon of
extraterrestrial spookiness.
Opposite the Sun, Mars will rise just
when the Sun sets, set just when the Sun rises, and be visible
the entire night.
Mars will not always be the
brightest object in tonight's sky, though.
Brighter than even Mars, almost spooky
Venus will light up the western horizon for a brief time just after sunset.
Please have a safe and happy
All Hallows Eve.
APOD: 2005 September 17 - The Shadow of Phobos
Explanation:
Hurtling through space above the Red Planet,
potato-shaped Phobos completes an orbit of Mars
in less than eight hours.
In fact, since its orbital period is shorter than
the planet's rotation period,
Mars-based
observers
see Phobos rise in the west and set in the east -
traveling
from horizon to horizon in about 5 1/2 hours.
These three images from the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS)
spacecraft
record the oval
shadow of Phobos racing over
western Xanthe Terra on August 26, 1999.
The area imaged is about 250 kilometers across and is seen
in panels from left to right as
red filter, blue filter, and combined color composite views
from the MGS wide-angle camera system.
The three dark spots most easily seen in the
red filter image are likely small fields of dark
sand dunes on crater floors.
Standing
in the shadow of Phobos, you would see the
Martian version of a solar eclipse!
APOD: 2005 August 9 - The Belt of Venus over Elwood Beach
Explanation:
Although you've surely seen it, you might not have noticed it.
During a cloudless twilight, just before
sunrise or after
sunset,
part of the atmosphere above the horizon appears
slightly off-color, slightly pink.
Called the Belt of Venus, this off-color band between the dark
eclipsed sky and the
blue sky can be seen in nearly every direction
including that opposite the Sun.
Straight above, blue sky is normal sunlight reflecting off the atmosphere.
In the Belt of Venus, however, the
atmosphere reflects light from the setting (or rising)
Sun which appears more red.
The Belt of Venus can be seen from any location with a
clear horizon.
Pictured above, the Belt of Venus was photographed behind
Elwood
Beach in
Melbourne,
Australia.
The belt is
frequently
caught
by
accident
in
other
photographs.
APOD: 2005 August 5 - HD 188753: Triple Sunset
Explanation:
Although it looks like fiction, this artist's vision
of sunset on an
alien world
is based on fact --
the
recent discovery
of a hot, jupiter-sized planet orbiting in
triple star
system HD 188753.
Only 149 light-years away in the
constellation Cygnus, HD 188753's
massive planet was detected by astronomer Maciej Konacki
after analyzing detailed spectroscopic data
from the Keck
Observatory.
The large planet itself is depicted at the upper
left in
this
imagined view from the well-illuminated
surface of a hypothetical rocky moon.
From
this
perspective,
the closest, hottest and most massive
star in the triple system, a star only a little hotter
than the Sun, has set below distant peaks.
The two other suns nearing the horizon are both cooler and
farther from the large planet.
While other hot, jupiter-like planets
are known to orbit
nearby stars, the "crowded" multiple star nature of this system
challenges current theories of
planet formation.
APOD: 2005 July 11 - Sunrise Over Kilimanjaro
Explanation:
Is the Roof of Africa on fire?
A group hiking at 6 am near the top of
Mt. Kilimanjaro watched the rising sun peak above the clouds and
the horizon light up red.
Don't worry -- in this case the highest volcano in Africa is not even erupting.
The spectacular sunrise
colors are caused by light scattering off the
atmosphere and small cloud particles.
If all of the scattered light that makes the
sky blue were added back into the scene,
the sunrise would appear Sun-colored and not so red.
A similar light scattering effect involving small airborne
dust particles causes
sunsets on Mars to be red
and has been used to determine the sizes of particles in the
rings of Saturn.
During this trek in 2000 November, a group of about 30 reached the
Kilomanjaro
summit after a six-day climb.
APOD: 2005 June 30 - Three Planets from Mt Hamilton
Explanation:
Venus, Mercury, and Saturn
wandered close together
in western evening skies last week.
On Saturnday,
June 25, astronomer R. Jay GaBany recorded
this snapshot of their eye-catching planetary conjunction,
from historic Lick Observatory
on Mt. Hamilton,
California, USA.
The view looks toward the Pacific shortly after sunset
with the lights of San Jose and the southern San Francisco
Bay area in the foreground.
Of course, Venus is
the brightest of the trio.
Mercury is nearby on the right
and Saturn is below and left,
closest to the horizon.
Farther to the right of the planetary triangle are
Pollux and Castor,
twin
stars of Gemini, with
Regulus,
bright star
of the constellation Leo, at the very upper left corner of the
picture.
In the
coming days, Venus and Mercury remain close,
while Saturn continues to drop below them, toward the horizon.
APOD: 2005 June 24 - Planets in the West
Explanation:
This weekend
three planets will grace
the western sky,
forming a lovely trio easily visible shortly after sunset.
Saturday evening in particular will find
Saturn,
Venus, and
Mercury all within a 2 degree circle
(about the size of your thumb held at arm's length)
above the western horizon.
Recorded last Sunday, June 19, this image shows the same
three planets arrayed along the
ecliptic plane above a Colorado
Rocky Mountain skyline.
Venus is easiest to pick out of the twilight, the brightest
celestial beacon below picture center, with Saturn
above and to the left of Venus, and Mercury closest to the
horizon, right of prominent Pinnacle Peak.
By Saturday, the
wandering planets
will draw even closer together.
For help spotting the planets here, put your cursor over the
picture.
APOD: 2005 June 23 - Moonrise, Cape Sounion, Greece
Explanation:
The Moon was full this month on June 22nd, only a day after
the northern hemisphere's summer solstice.
Since this solstice
marked
the northernmost point of
the Sun's annual motion through planet
Earth's sky, the full
Moon rising near the ecliptic plane
opposite the Sun was
at its farthest south for the year.
Only a month earlier, on May 23rd, astronomer Anthony Ayiomamitis
recorded
this picture of another southerly full Moon
rising above Cape Sounion, Greece.
The twenty-four hundred year old
Temple
of Poseidon lies in the foreground,
also visible to sailors on
the Aegean Sea.
In this well-planned, single exposure, a long telephoto lens
makes the Moon loom large, but even without
optical aid casual skygazers often find
the
full Moon looking astonishingly large when seen near the horizon.
That powerful visual effect is known as
the Moon Illusion.
APOD: 2005 May 28 - Himalayan Horizon From Space
Explanation:
This
stunning aerial view shows the rugged snow covered
peaks of
a Himalayan mountain range in Nepal.
The seventh-highest peak on the planet, Dhaulagiri,
is the high point
on the horizon at the left while
in the foreground lies the southern Tibetan Plateau of China.
But, contrary to appearances, this picture wasn't taken from
an airliner cruising at 30,000 feet.
Instead it was taken with a 35mm camera and telephoto lens by the
Expedition 1 crew aboard the
International Space Station --
orbiting 200 nautical
miles above the Earth.
The Himalayan mountains
were created by crustal plate tectonics
on planet Earth
some 70 million years ago, as the Indian plate began a
collision with the Eurasian plate.
Himalayan uplift still continues today at a rate of a
few millimeters per year.
APOD: 2005 May 20 - Aurora Iowa
Explanation:
Early last Sunday morning stars were not the only lights in Iowa
skies.
The northern lights also shone from the heavens, extending
across the midwestern USA and
other locations not often
graced with auroral displays.
The wide-ranging auroral activity was triggered as a
coronal
mass ejection - an
energetic cloud of particles blasted outward from
the
Sun a few days earlier - collided with
planet Earth's magnetosphere.
Alerted to conditions
ripe
for aurora, photographer Stan Richard
recorded this aparition over Saylorville Lake, near
Des Moines.
Bright planet Mars in the constellation
Aquarius is above the
horizon near the center of the eastward-looking view.
While the colorful rays seem to end just above the water, they are
actually at altitudes of 100 kilometers
or more.
APOD: 2005 March 23 - A Dust Devil Swirling on Mars
Explanation:
What is that wisp on the horizon?
Scientists think that the slight white apparition is actually a
Martian dust devil that was caught swirling across
Mars.
The above image was taken earlier this month by the
robotic rover Spirit.
The swirling cloud was found by comparing the
above image to a previous image of the same area.
Fresh dust devil tracks
have been seen on Mars before, but actually seeing
one up close was a surprise.
The most similar phenomena to Martian dust devils on Earth are terrestrial dust devils,
tornadoes and waterspouts.
The ultimate
cause of Martian dust devils remains unknown,
but might be related to rising air heated by sun-warmed
rocks and soil.
Just the previous day, Spirit's power acquisition
increased unexpectedly, possibly the result of a
dust devil
passing near or over the Spirit rover and effectively cleaning its
solar panels.
APOD: 2005 March 18 - Moon, Mercury, Monaco
Explanation:
Low on the western horizon after sunset, a
slender crescent Moon and
wandering planet Mercury join
the lights of Menton and Monaco
along the French Riviera.
Astronomer
Vincent Jacques took advantage of this
gorgeous photo opportunity
a week ago on March 11, when the Moon and Mercury
were separated in the sky by just three degrees.
Of course, the Moon in a slender crescent
phase
is always
seen near the horizon, as is Mercury - a bright planet which
can be otherwise difficult to glimpse as it never strays far
from the Sun in Earth's sky.
In the coming days
good views of Mercury will indeed be
fleeting as the solar system's
innermost
planet is rapidly
dropping closer to the glare of the setting Sun.
But tonight a waxing Moon will join another bright planet
wandering overhead
through the evening sky,
Saturn.
APOD: 2005 March 7 - Mercury Over Leeds
Explanation:
Have you ever seen the planet Mercury?
This week might be a good time.
Because Mercury
orbits so close to the Sun, it never wanders far from the Sun in Earth's sky.
If trailing the Sun, Mercury will be
visible
low on the horizon for only a short while after
sunset.
If leading the Sun, Mercury will be
visible only shortly before sunrise.
So at certain times of the year an informed
skygazer with a little determination can usually
pick Mercury out
from a site with an clear horizon.
Above, a lot of determination has been combined with a
little digital trickery to show
Mercury's successive positions
during March of 2004.
Each picture was taken from the same location in Leeds,
England exactly 33 minutes after sunset.
Over the next two weeks, Mercury
will again be well placed for
viewing above the western horizon at sunset,
but by the third week in March it will have faded
and dropped into the twilight.
APOD: 2005 February 17 - Melas, Candor, and Ophir: Valleys of Mariner
Explanation:
First imaged by the Mariner 9 spacecraft,
Valles Marineris,
the grand canyon
of Mars,
is a system of enormous depressions or chasmas
that
stretch some 4,000 kilometers along the Martian equator.
Looking north over the
canyon's central regions,
dark Melas Chasma lies in the
foreground of this spectacular
perspective view.
Behind it are Candor Chasma and the steep walls of Ophir Chasma near
the horizon.
Faulting, surface collapse and landslides are seen to be
part of the complex geologic history of
these
dramatic features, with
layered deposits
also found within the canyon system.
Recorded in 2004,
the
image represents data from
the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA's
Mars Express spacecraft.
Melas, Candor and Ophir are about 200 kilometers wide
and 5 to 7 kilometers deep.
APOD: 2005 January 29 - Southern Cross in Mauna Loa Skies
Explanation:
Gazing across this gorgeous skyscape, the
Southern Cross and
stars of the constellation Centaurus are seen above
the outline of
Mauna Loa
(Long Mountain), planet Earth's
largest volcano.
Unfamiliar
to sky gazers north of about 25 degrees north latitude,
the Southern Cross, constellation Crux, is near the horizon
to the left of Mauna Loa's summit.
A compact constellation of bright stars, the long axis of the cross
conveniently points south toward the southern
celestial pole.
The top of the cross is marked by the lovely pale red star
Gamma Crucis,
which is in fact a red giant star about 120 light-years distant.
Stars of the grand
constellation Centaurus almost engulf
the Southern Cross with blue giant
Beta Centauri, and
yellowish Alpha Centauri,
appearing as the brightest stars to the left of Gamma Crucis.
At a distance of 4.3 light-years,
Alpha Centauri,
the closest star to the Sun,
is actually a triple star system which includes a
star similar to the Sun.
But what caused the reddish streaks in the foreground of this time
exposure?
Alas, it is the mundane glow of lights from cars (not molten
lava!)
traveling the road to Hilo,
Hawaii.
APOD: 2005 January 27 - Shadow Set
Explanation:
A nearly full Moon
and planet Earth's shadow
set together in this scene
captured Monday from snowy Mt. Jelm, home of the
Wyoming Infrared Observatory.
For early morning risers (and late to bed
astronomers),
shadow set in the western sky is a
daily
apparition whose subtle beauty
is often overlooked in
favor of the more colorful eastern horizon.
Extending through the dense atmosphere,
Earth's setting shadow is seen
in this picture as a dark blue band along the distant horizon, bounded above
by a pinkish glow or antitwilight arch.
Also known as the Belt of Venus, the arch's
lovely color is due to
backscattering of reddened light from the rising Sun.
The setting Moon's light is
also reddened by the long sight-line
through the atmosphere and echoes the
dawn sky's yellow-orange hues.
APOD: 2004 December 9 - Jupiter and the Moon's Shadowed Horizon
Explanation:
Early Tuesday
morning, December 7th, June Croft thought the
southeastern sky above Atmore, Alabama, USA was beautiful.
Watching
the Moon rise through gossamer clouds, she
noted, " ... the crescent Moon looked like it was held in
the sky by a star just off its shadowed horizon."
What was that star?
Bright Jupiter of course, and
some watched as the Moon actually
occulted or passed in front of
the Solar System's reigning gas
giant planet.
For astronomer Jimmy Westlake in Colorado, Jupiter was
already hidden at moonrise that morning,
but later he was able to record this lovely image,
not unlike the view that inspired Croft.
Seen through gossamer clouds, Jupiter along with large
Jovian satellites
Ganymede and Callisto (bottom to top) has emerged from
behind the crescent Moon's
shadowed horizon.
APOD: 2004 November 13 - Moon Over Shiraz
Explanation:
Early morning risers
around the world have enjoyed the
sight of bright planets
in this week's predawn skies -
further enhanced by the celestial spectacle of the waning
crescent Moon.
From some locations the Moon was seen to pass in front
of
Jupiter or Venus, a lunar occultation.
Recorded near sunrise on November 10th from
Shiraz, Iran, this
eastern horizon view finds Jupiter (top) and a brilliant Venus
in line with
the Moon, a lovely conjunction of the three brightest
objects in the night sky.
Although the Moon has
now
fallen out of the early morning
scene,
Venus and Jupiter (along with a much fainter Mars) still precede
the rising Sun above the eastern horizon.
APOD: 2004 November 12 - Missouri's Green Ribbon Sky
Explanation:
The critics rave -
"Amazing!", "Unbelievable!", "The best I've ever seen!"
They aren't talking about
a movie, though.
Instead, even casual sky critics are remarking on November's
stunning auroral displays, visible with
surprising intensities
well beyond the confines of high latitudes where
auroral activity
is normally observed.
In fact, in this example of an unforgettable performance a
green ribbon of auroral light
stretches from horizon to horizon - recorded on November 7th
with a fisheye lens near Warrensburg, Missouri, USA.
Want to see an aurora?
Relatively wide-spread displays
may continue, triggered
by activity from an energetic sunspot region.
APOD: 2004 October 10 - Sunspot Loops in Ultraviolet
Explanation:
It was a quiet day on the
Sun.
The above image shows, however, that even during off days the
Sun's surface is a busy place.
Shown in ultraviolet light, the relatively
cool dark regions have temperatures of thousands of degrees
Celsius.
Large sunspot group AR 9169 is
visible as the bright area near the horizon.
The bright glowing gas flowing around the
sunspots
has a temperature of over one million degrees
Celsius.
The reason for the high temperatures is
unknown
but thought to be related to the rapidly changing
magnetic field loops that channel solar plasma.
Sunspot group AR 9169 moved across the
Sun during 2000 September and decayed in a few weeks.
APOD: 2004 September 11 - The Star Trails of Kilimanjaro
Explanation:
The night had no moon, but
the
stars were out.
And camped at 16,000 feet on
Mt. Kilimanjaro,
photographer Dan Heller recorded
this marvelous 3 1/2 hour long exposure.
Here the landscape is lit mostly by
the stars.
Flashlights give the tents an erie internal radiance while
the greenish glow from the
distant city lights of Moshi, Tanzania filter through the clouds below.
The view from this
famous
equatorial African mountain is
toward the south, putting
the South Celestial Pole close to the horizon on the far left,
near the center of the graceful concentric
star trail arcs.
In the thin air and clear dark skies, even the ghostly
Milky Way
left a faint triangular glow as it swept across the middle of
the dreamlike scene.
APOD: 2004 August 25 - Zodiacal Light and the False Dawn
Explanation:
An unusual triangle of light will be particularly
bright near the eastern horizon before sunrise
during the next two months for observers in Earth's northern
hemisphere.
Once considered a false dawn, this triangle of light is actually
Zodiacal Light, light reflected from
interplanetary dust particles.
The triangle is clearly visible in the left frame taken in
Namibia in May.
Rolling the
cursor
over the image will bring up labels.
Bright
zodiacal light can be seen nearly every clear moonless
morning over the next few months on images taken by the
Mauna Kea,
Hawaii fisheye
CONCAM of the
Night Sky Live project.
Zodiacal dust
orbits the Sun
predominantly in the same plane as the planets: the
ecliptic.
Zodiacal light is so bright this time of year because the
dust band is oriented
nearly vertical at sunrise,
so that the thick air near the horizon does not
block
out relatively bright reflecting dust.
Zodiacal light is also bright for
people in Earth's northern hemisphere in March and April just after sunset.
APOD: 2004 June 6 - Mercury Spotting
Explanation:
Can you spot the planet?
The diminutive disk of Mercury, the solar system's
innermost planet,
spent about five hours crossing in front of the enormous solar disk
on 2003 May 7,
as
viewed from the general vicinity of planet Earth.
The Sun was above the horizon during
the entire transit for observers
in Europe, Africa, Asia, or Australia, and the horizon was
certainly
no problem for the sun-staring SOHO spacecraft.
Seen as a dark spot,
Mercury progresses from left to right
(top panel to bottom) in these four images from SOHO's extreme
ultraviolet camera.
The panels' false-colors correspond to different wavelengths in
the extreme ultraviolet which highlight regions above the Sun's
visible surface.
This
was the first of 14 transits of Mercury which will occur during the 21st
century,
but the next similar event will be a much more rare
transit of Venus this coming Tuesday.
Need help spotting Mercury?
Just click on the picture.
APOD: 2004 June 4 - Sedna at Noon
Explanation:
Standing on Sedna - the solar system's most
distant known
planetoid - your view of the Sun at high noon might look
something like this.
An artist's dramatic vision, the picture shows the
Sun suspended above the nearby horizon as a bright star
immersed in
the dusty ecliptic plane.
Within the
dust-scattered sunlight are more familiar
members of the solar system, including planet Earth.
But at a distance of about 13 billion kilometers
(8 billion miles) Earth would only be visible in
binoculars or a small telescope.
In Sedna's dark, daytime skies,
the noonday Sun is also joined by
the faint stars and obscuring dust clouds of the Milky Way,
suspended on the left above stark, ruddy terrain.
For Sedna-based sky gazers, all planets have interior
orbits and would remain close to the Sun in Sedna's skies.
Of course, for earthbound astronomers, interior planets
Venus and Mercury
also remain near the Sun, with
Venus scheduled
for a rare crossing of the solar disc
on June 8.
APOD: 2004 May 27 - Two Comets in Southern Skies
Explanation:
Wielding a very wide-angle lens, astronomer Gordon Garradd was
able to capture two naked-eye comets in
one
picture looking
toward the west from Loomberah, New South Wales, Australia.
At the far left lies comet
C/2002 T7 (LINEAR)
and at the far right, comet
C/2001 Q4 (NEAT).
Recorded on the night of May 20th, the area around
each of the comets has been separately enhanced
here, making it easier to discern their extended tails
streaming away from the Sun.
While comet T7 (LINEAR) is the brighter of the two comets,
both are now fading.
Still, they may be
visible for northern and southern
observers with Q4 (NEAT) easiest to spot in the north.
Of course, with
bright Venus near the center
on the horizon and the lights of nearby Tamworth city glowing at the
bottom right, the two comets are not alone in
this
heavenly view.
APOD: 2004 May 25 - Moon Between the Stones
Explanation:
Despite clouds and rain showers astronomer Phillip Perkins managed
to spot a reddened,
eclipsed Moon between the stones of this
well known monument to the Sun during May's total lunar eclipse,
from Stonehenge, England.
When he recorded
this dramatic
picture, the rising Moon was
only about 5 degrees above the horizon, but conveniently
located through a gap in the
circle of ancient stones.
Although at first glance there appears to be an eerie,
luminous pool of water in the foreground, Perkins notes that his
daughter produced the artistic lighting effect.
She illuminated a fallen stone and surrounding grass with a
flashgun from her hiding place behind the large
sarsen
stone to the right of center.
As the picture looks toward the southeast, the stone just below
the Moon is one of the inner bluestones rather than
the famous Heel Stone, which marks the
northeast direction of the summer solstice
sunrise.
APOD: 2004 May 1 - A Western Sky at Twilight
Explanation:
On April 23rd, the Moon along with planets Saturn, Mars, and Venus
(and planet Earth of course ...)
were all visible
in the west at twilight,
captured here
from a site near Saylorvillle Lake north of Des Moines, Iowa, USA.
Putting your cursor
over the image will label our fellow
solar system wanderers
and also reveal the approximate trajectory of the
ecliptic plane - defined
by Earth's orbit around the Sun - angling
above the western horizon.
After sunset tonight, the western sky will present a
similar arrangement of planets, although the Moon will
have moved east out of the picture,
passing bright Jupiter along the ecliptic and heading for
May
4th's total lunar eclipse.
May
could also be a good month
for comets.
APOD: 2004 April 1 - April Fools Day More Intense On Mars
Explanation:
Today, April 1st, astrophysicists have announced a surprising
discovery -
April
Fools Day is more
intense on Mars!
Though the discovery is contrary to accepted theories of April
Fools Day, researchers note that there are several likely
causes for the severe martian
April Fools phenomenon.
For starters, gravity, the force that opposes comedy
throughout the universe,
is only about 3/8ths as strong on Mars' surface as it
is on planet Earth.
Also, a
martian day, called a sol, lasts nearly 40 minutes longer than
an earth day.
And furthermore ... well, as soon as they think of some
more reasons, they've promised to tell us.
Happy April Fools day from the editors at APOD!
Editors note:
Mars rover Spirit
recorded this image looking out
toward the eastern horizon and the Columbia Hills over 2 kilometers
in the distance.
Its
journey across this
rocky martian terrain could take from 60 to 90 sols.
APOD: 2004 March 26 - Moon and Planets Sky
Explanation:
Look up into the sky tonight and without a telescope
or binoculars you might have
a
view like this one of Moon, planets and stars.
The lovely
photo was taken on March 23rd,
and captures the crescent Moon on the horizon with Venus above it.
Both brilliant celestial bodies are over-exposed.
Farther above Venus is the tinted glow of Mars with
the Pleiades star cluster just to the red planet's right.
The V-shaped arrangement of
stars to the left of Mars is the Hydaes star cluster.
Bright red giant
Aldebaran, not itself a member of the Hyades
cluster, marks the top left of the V.
During
the next week, all five naked-eye planets,
Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, along with
the Moon
will grace the evening sky together - a
lunar and planetary spectacle that can be
enjoyed by skygazers
around the world.
But look just after sunset, low on the western horizon,
to see Mercury before it sets.
The next similar gathering
of the planets will be in 2008.
APOD: 2004 March 24 - Intriguing Dimples Near Eagle Crater on Mars
Explanation:
What are those unusual looking dimples?
Looking back toward Eagle crater, its landing place on
Mars, the
robot rover Opportunity
has spotted some unusual depressions in the Martian soil.
The dimples, visible above on the image left,
each measure about one meter across and appear to have
light colored rock in their interior.
The nearest dimple has been dubbed
"Homeplate",
while the next furthest one out is called "First Base."
Scrolling right will reveal a magnificent panorama including the rover in the foreground, the backshell and parachute that detached from Opportunity
before it landed near the horizon, Eagle crater in the center,
Opportunity's tracks as it rolled away from Eagle crater, and
wind blown ripples of
Martian soil in every direction.
Further analysis of
rocks photographed by Opportunity has
yielded evidence that Opportunity has landed on an
evaporated shoreline of an ancient salt-water ocean.
APOD: 2004 March 20 - Equinox + 1
Explanation:
Twice a year, at the Spring and Fall
equinox, the Sun rises due east.
In an emphatic demonstration of this
celestial
alignment, photographer Joe Orman recorded this
inspiring
image of the Sun rising exactly along the east-west oriented
Western Canal, in Tempe,Arizona, USA.
But he waited until March 21st, one day after the northern
Spring equinox in 2001, to photograph the striking view.
Why was the rising Sun due east one day
after the equinox?
At Tempe's latitude
the Sun rises
at an angle, arcing southward
as it climbs above the horizon.
Because the distant mountains hide the true horizon, the Sun shifts
slightly southward by the time it clears the
mountain tops.
Waiting 24 hours allowed the Sun
to rise just north of east and arc back to an exactly eastern alignment
for the photo.
Today's equinox
finds the Sun on the celestial equator
at 0649
Universal Time.
APOD: 2004 February 4 - Opportunity's Horizon
Explanation:
Remarkably, the Opportunity Mars rover lies in a
small martian
impact crater about 3 meters deep and 22 meters wide.
For 360 degrees,
Opportunity's horizon stretches to the right in this new
color mosaic image from the
rover's panoramic camera.
Notable in this view of the generally
dark, smooth terrain are
surface imprints left by the
lander's airbags and an
outcropping of light-colored, layered rock about 8 meters
away toward the northwest.
Though they look imposing, the rocks in
the tantalizing outcrop are only a few centimeters high and will
be dwarfed by the cart-sized rover
itself during future close-up investigations.
Opportunity has now rolled off its lander and, along with
the restored Spirit rover, is directly
exploring
the martian surface.
APOD: 2004 January 5 - Spirit Pan from Gusev Crater
Explanation:
After a seven month voyage of nearly 500 million kilometers
through interplanetary space, NASA's
Spirit
Rover has reached the surface of Mars.
Scroll right and see a mosaic panorama of Spirit's
first images returned
from its landing site in Gusev Crater!
Taken by Spirit's
navigation camera, the panorama covers 360 degrees,
with the spacecraft in the foreground and the floor of
Gusev Crater,
thought to be an ancient lake bed, extending to the horizon.
The entry,
descent, and landing phase of Spirit's mission -
referred to by mission planners as "Six Minutes of Terror" -
began Saturday night around 8:30pm PST as Spirit entered
the martian atmosphere at about 20,000 kilometers per hour.
Updates
on Spirit's status will be posted throughout the day.
APOD: 2003 November 25 - A Late Leonid from a Sparse Shower
Explanation:
The
2003 Leonids Meteor Shower contained relatively few meteors.
As expected and unlike the
last
few
years,
the Earth just did not pass through any dense
particle streams left over by the Sun-orbiting
Comet Tempel-Tuttle.
Preliminary reports had the peak
meteor rates only as high as about one relatively faint
meteor a minute even from good locations at good times.
Pictured above is one of the brighter
Leonids of 2003, caught by one of the continuously
operating night sky web cameras (CONCAMs) of the global
Night Sky Live project.
The
fisheye image shows the night sky from
horizon to horizon above
Mauna Kea,
Hawaii,
USA.
The image is annotated with several bright stars and planets.
Note that this meteor, as do all Leonids, appears to
emanate from the constellation Leo,
labeled on the upper left.
Although the peak of the
Leonids this year was on November 19,
this meteor flashed through the sky the next night.
APOD: 2003 October 21 - The Belt of Venus over the Valley of the Moon
Explanation:
Although you've surely seen it, you might not have noticed it.
During a cloudless twilight, just before
sunrise or after
sunset,
part of the atmosphere above the horizon appears
slightly off-color, slightly pink.
Called the Belt of Venus, this off-color band between the dark
eclipsed sky and the
blue sky can be seen in nearly every direction
including that opposite the Sun.
Straight above, blue sky is normal sunlight reflecting off the atmosphere.
In the Belt of Venus, however, the
atmosphere reflects light from the setting (or rising)
Sun which appears more red.
The Belt of Venus can be seen from any location with a
clear horizon.
Pictured above, the Belt of Venus was photographed above
morning fog in the
Valley of the Moon, a famous wine-producing region in northern
California,
USA.
The belt is
frequently
caught
by
accident
in
other
photographs.
APOD: 2003 October 11 - Moonrise Over Seattle
Explanation:
Is the Moon larger when near the horizon?
No -- as shown above, the
Moon
appears to be very nearly the same size no matter
its location on the sky.
Oddly, the cause or causes for the common
Moon
Illusion are still being debated.
Two leading explanations both hinge on the
illusion
that foreground objects make a
horizon Moon
seem farther in the distance.
The historically most
popular explanation then holds that the
mind interprets more distant objects as wider, while a
more
recent explanation adds that the distance illusion
may actually make the eye focus differently.
Either way, the
angular
diameter of the Moon is always about 0.5
degrees.
In the above time-lapse sequence taken near the end of 2001,
the Moon was briefly re-imaged every 2.5 minutes,
with the last exposure of longer duration to bring up a
magnificent panorama of the city of
Seattle.
APOD: 2003 August 22 - Shadow Rise
Explanation:
As the Sun sets, the Earth's
shadow rises up from the east.
The subtle beauty of
this
daily apparition is often overlooked
in favor of the brighter, more colorful
western horizon.
But while gazing toward a nearly full rising Moon on August 9,
astronomer Steve Mandel admired the shadow rise from his driveway
near Soquel, California, USA.
His view looks east from the northern tip of Monterey Bay toward
Fremont Peak, the highest point in the small mountain range on
the horizon.
The
Earth's rising shadow is cast through the
dense atmosphere and is seen in his picture as the dark blue band
along the horizon, bounded above by a pinkish purple glow or
antitwilight arch.
Also known as the Belt of Venus,
the arch's lovely color is due
to backscattering of
reddened
light from the setting Sun.
APOD: 2003 May 8 - Mercury Spotting
Explanation:
Can you spot the planet?
The diminutive disk of Mercury, the solar system's
innermost planet,
spent about five hours crossing in front of the enormous solar disk
yesterday (Wednesday, May 7th),
as
viewed from the general vicinity of planet Earth.
The Sun was above the horizon during
the entire transit for observers
in Europe, Africa, Asia, or Australia, and the horizon was
certainly
no problem for the sun-staring SOHO spacecraft.
Seen as a dark spot,
Mercury progresses from left to right
(top panel to bottom) in these four images from SOHO's extreme
ultraviolet camera.
The panels' false-colors correspond to different wavelengths in
the extreme ultraviolet which highlight regions above the Sun's
visible surface.
This
is the first
of 14 transits of Mercury which
will occur during the 21st
century,
but the next similar event will be a
transit
of Venus in June of 2004.
Need help spotting Mercury?
Just click on the picture.
APOD: 2003 April 12 - Mercury on the Horizon
Explanation:
Have you ever seen the planet Mercury?
Because
Mercury orbits so close to the Sun,
it never wanders far from the Sun in
Earth's sky.
If trailing the Sun,
Mercury will be visible
low on the horizon for only a short while
after sunset.
If leading the Sun, Mercury
will be visible only shortly before
sunrise.
So at certain times of the year an
informed skygazer with a little determination
can usually pick Mercury
out from a site with an unobscured horizon.
Above, a lot of determination has been combined
with a little
digital trickery to
show Mercury's successive positions during March of 2000.
Each picture was taken from the same location in Spain
when the Sun itself was 10 degrees below the
horizon and superposed
on the single most
photogenic sunset.
By the middle of this month, Mercury will again be well
placed for viewing above the western horizon at sunset,
but by the end of April it will have faded and dropped into the
twilight.
On May 7th,
Mercury
will cross the Sun's disk.
APOD: 2003 April 6 - Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
Explanation:
This moon is doomed.
Mars,
the red planet named for the
Roman god of war, has two tiny moons,
Phobos and
Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for
Fear and Panic.
These
Martian
moons may well be captured
asteroids
originating in the main asteroid belt between Mars
and Jupiter or perhaps from even more
distant reaches of the
Solar System.
In this 1978
Viking 1 orbiter image,
the largest moon, Phobos, is indeed seen to be a
heavily cratered asteroid-like object.
About 17 miles across, Phobos really zips through the
Martian sky.
Actually rising above Mars' western horizon and setting in the east,
it completes an orbit in less than 8 hours.
But Phobos orbits so close to Mars,
(about 5,800 kilometers above the surface compared to 400,000 kilometers
for our Moon) that
gravitational tidal forces are dragging it down.
In 100 million years or so it will likely crash into the
surface or be shattered by stress caused by the
relentless
tidal forces, the debris forming a ring around Mars.
APOD: 2003 March 29 - The Shadow of Phobos
Explanation:
Hurtling through space above the Red Planet,
potato-shaped Phobos completes an orbit of Mars
in less than eight hours.
In fact, since its orbital period is shorter than
the planet's rotation period,
Mars-based observers
see Phobos rise in the west and set in the east -
traveling from horizon to horizon in about 5 1/2 hours.
These three images from the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS)
spacecraft
record the oval
shadow of Phobos racing over
western Xanthe Terra on August 26, 1999.
The area imaged is about 250 kilometers across and is seen
in panels from left to right as
red filter, blue filter, and combined color composite views
from the MGS wide-angle camera system.
The three dark spots most easily seen in the
red filter image are likely small fields of dark
sand dunes on crater floors.
Standing
in the shadow of Phobos, you would
see the
Martian version of a solar eclipse!
APOD: 2003 March 15 - Apollo 12: Self-Portrait
Explanation:
Is it art?
In November of 1969,
Apollo 12 astronaut-photographer
Charles "Pete" Conrad recorded
this
masterpiece while documenting colleague
Alan Bean's
lunar soil collection activities on
the Oceanus Procellarum.
The image is dramatic and stark.
Bean is faceless.
The harsh environment of the Moon's Ocean of Storms is
echoed in his helmet's perfectly composed reflection of Conrad and
the
lunar horizon.
Works of photojournalists originally
intent on recording the human condition on planet Earth,
such as Lewis W. Hine's images from New York City
in the early 20th century, or
Margaret
Bourke-White's magazine photography are widely
regarded as art.
Similarly many documentary astronomy and
space images
can be appreciated for their artistic and
esthetic appeal.
APOD: 2003 March 6 - Comet NEAT in Southern Skies
Explanation:
After last month's dramatic swoop past the
Sun, Comet NEAT (C/2002 V1)
appeared as a naked-eye comet,
emerging from the evening twilight in planet Earth's southern skies.
On March 1st,
New Zealand photographer Noel Munford captured this telephoto view of
the outbound comet close to the southwestern horizon
against the faint stars of the constellation
Sculptor.
He reports that the picture is a good representation of the comet's
visual appearance on that date and estimates the impressive tail to be
five or six degrees long.
Discovered
last November as part of the
Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking
program, there was some speculation that this comet would not
survive its close encounter with the Sun.
However, Comet NEAT is now
returning to
the outer solar system,
diving
southward and fading fast.
APOD: 2003 February 26 - Anticrepuscular Rays Over Horseshoe Canyon
Explanation:
What's happening over the horizon?
Although the scene may appear somehow
supernatural,
nothing more unusual is occurring than a
setting Sun and some well placed clouds.
Pictured above are
anticrepuscular rays.
To understand them, start by picturing common
crepuscular rays that are seen any time that sunlight pours though scattered clouds.
Now although sunlight indeed travels along
straight lines, the projections of these lines onto the
spherical sky are
great circles.
Therefore, the
crepuscular rays from a
setting (or rising) sun
will appear to re-converge on the other side of the sky.
At the anti-solar point 180 degrees around from the
Sun, they are referred to as
anticrepuscular rays.
While enjoying the sunset after dinner near
Horseshoe Canyon in Utah, the photographer chanced to find that an even
more spectacular sight was occurring in the other direction
just over the canyon -- a particularly vivid set of
anticrepuscular rays.
APOD: 2003 February 16 - Southwest Mercury
Explanation:
The planet Mercury resembles a moon. Mercury's old surface is heavily cratered like many moons.
Mercury is larger than most moons but smaller than
Jupiter's moon
Ganymede and
Saturn's moon
Titan.
Mercury is much denser and more massive than any moon,
though, because it is made mostly of iron. In fact, the
Earth is the only planet more dense.
A visitor to Mercury's surface
would see some strange sights.
Because
Mercury rotates exactly three times every two orbits around the
Sun, and because
Mercury's orbit is so elliptical, a visitor to
Mercury might see the
Sun rise, stop in the sky, go back toward the rising
horizon,
stop again, and then set quickly over the
other horizon.
From Earth, Mercury's proximity to the
Sun causes it to be
visible only for a short time just after
sunset or just before sunrise.
APOD: 2003 February 10 - Comet NEAT Approaches the Sun
Explanation:
A comet
may likely become visible to the unaided eye over the
next few days above the
horizon where the Sun has just set.
Comet NEAT (C/ 2002 V1), discovered last November, has
brightened dramatically as it approached the Sun.
Over the next few days, the
quickly setting comet could
appear as bright as second
magnitude.
On February 18 it will round the Sun well within the orbit of
Mercury.
During surrounding days, the Sun's glare will effectively
hide the comet to human observers.
It is quite probable, though, that
Comet NEAT will standout prominently in
images taken by the Sun-looking
SOHO satellite.
Pictured above,
Comet NEAT's complex and developing
tail was photographed on
January 29 (top) and February 2.
Sky enthusiasts
should remember to never look directly at the Sun.
APOD: 2003 January 23 - Launch of the Sun Pillar
Explanation:
On January 16, NASA's space shuttle
Columbia roared into blue morning
skies above Kennedy Space Center on
STS-107,
the first shuttle mission of 2003.
But this is not a picture of
that launch!
It was taken on the morning of January 16 though, at sunrise, looking
eastward toward Lake Ontario from just outside of Caledon, Ontario,
Canada.
In the picture a sun pillar, sunlight reflecting
from ice crystals
gently falling through the cold air, seems to shoot above the fiery
Sun still low on the horizon.
By chance, fog
and clouds forming over the relatively warm lake look
like billowing smoke from a rocket's
exhaust plume and complete the
launch illusion.
Amateur photographer Lauri Kangas stopped on his way to work to record
the eye-catching
sun pillar launch.
APOD: 2003 January 6 - Shadow Cone of a Total Solar Eclipse
Explanation:
Sometimes, during a
total eclipse of the Sun, a
strange shadow of darkness
can be seen stretching off into the distance.
Called a shadow cone, they are visible because the
Earth's atmosphere is not completely transparent,
scattering sunlight and hence
appearing blue during the day.
Shadow cones are particularly dramatic for
eclipses near the horizon,
as geometry creates a long corridor of sun-blocked air.
Visible above
is a shadow cone caught during a
total solar eclipse
visible last month from South
Australia.
The eclipsed Sun
itself still appears bright because of light from the
surrounding corona.
The digital camera on the left is zoomed in to show a
better image of the actual eclipse.
APOD: 2002 November 15 - Night Trails of Africa
Explanation:
Spanning southern to northern skies,
stars
trail across this panoramic view of the African
night from equatorial
Kenya.
The three hour long
exposure
was made on a clear, dark, mid November evening
facing due west and covers just over 180 degrees along the horizon.
So, the South Celestial Pole
is at the center of the
concentric arcs on the left and the
North Celestial Pole is
at the far right (scroll right).
And, you guessed it(!), the stars setting along the
Celestial Equator
leave the straight trails near the middle of the picture.
Well illustrated in this thoughtfully
composed panorama, the star
trails in the African night are, of course, not due to motions
of the individual stars but simply reflect the
daily rotation
of planet Earth itself.
APOD: 2002 November 7 - 2001 Leonids: Meteors in Perspective
Explanation:
The 2001 Leonid storm was so intense that the
meteor shower's
radiant, the point on the sky
from which the fleeting trails
seemed to diverge,
was easy to spot.
But the bits of debris that created the meteors really
moved along parallel paths, following the orbit of
their parent comet Tempel-Tuttle.
Their apparent divergence from the shower's radiant point was simply due to
perspective as
skygazers looked
toward the stream of cosmic debris.
During the 2001 Leonid storm, while the radiant was above
the horizon from
SoBaekSan Observatory
in South Korea, astronomer
Christophe Marlot made this single time exposure recording
star trail arcs and a number of meteors.
Since Marlot was looking away from the cosmic debris stream,
this perspective
actually shows red tinged meteor trails converging
toward a point
below the horizon and opposite the radiant -- the
Leonid shower's antiradiant.
APOD: 2002 September 15 - Zodiacal Light and the False Dawn
Explanation:
An unusual triangle of light will be particularly
bright near the eastern horizon before sunrise
during the next two months for observers in Earth's northern
hemisphere.
Once considered a false dawn, this triangle of light is actually
Zodiacal Light, light reflected from
interplanetary dust particles.
The triangle is clearly visible on the left of the
above frame taken from
Mauna Kea in
Hawaii on September 8 by one of the developing global network of fisheye nighttime web cameras,
called CONCAMs, of the
Night Sky Live Project.
Zodiacal dust
orbits the
Sun
predominantly in the same plane as the planets: the
ecliptic.
Zodiacal light is so bright this time of year because the
dust band is oriented
nearly vertical at sunrise,
so that the thick air near the horizon does not
block
out relatively bright reflecting dust.
Zodiacal light is also bright for
people in Earth's northern hemisphere
in March and April just after sunset.
APOD: 2002 September 10 - Venus Beyond the Storm
Explanation:
A thunderstorm, lightning, a bright star and
a bright planet all graced an evening sky for a short while near
Bismarck,
North Dakota,
USA two weeks ago.
Thick thunderclouds from a passing storm are the
origin of a strong cloud to ground
lightning strike.
Small areas of rain darken portions of the orange
sunset,
visible at the horizon above the vast prairie.
The planet Venus peeks below the clouds
on the lower left of the image.
Blue sky shines high above the distant storm,
streaked with high white cirrus clouds.
The bright star
Arcturus glitters near the image top, just left of center.
Just a few minutes later, only a memory and this picture remained.
APOD: 2002 August 5 - Rays from an Unexpected Aurora
Explanation:
This aurora was a bit of a surprise.
For starters, last Friday morning, no intense
auroral activity was expected at all.
Possibly more surprising, however, the
aurora appeared to show an usual structure of green
rays from some locations.
In the above image, captured from
North Dakota,
USA, a picket fence of green rays stretches toward the horizon.
Mirroring the green rays is a
red band, somewhat rare in its own right.
Lights from the cities of
Bismarck and Mandan are visible near the horizon.
Large sunspot groups indicate that activity from the
currently active Sun
is relatively likely, possibly causing
other streams of
energetic particles to cascade onto the Earth
and so causing more
auroras.
APOD: 2002 July 29 - A Setting Sun Trail
Explanation:
The Sun appears to move on the sky because the
Earth rotates.
The extreme brightness of the
Sun,
however, makes it difficult to capture a sun-trail --
the path the Sun traces on the sky.
To capture the above picture, a very
dark filter covered the camera lens for most of the time,
allowing only a trifle of light from the bright
Sun to peek through.
Just after the Sun had dipped below the
horizon
but before it was completely dark,
the thick filter was removed and the
pretty foreground scene
was captured.
Slight flares
appeared when the Sun went behind thin clouds.
Star-trails and
planet-trails
are much easier to image, and a similar
Moon trail has also recently been imaged.
APOD: 2002 June 25 - Venus and Jupiter Over Belfast
Explanation:
Venus and Jupiter appeared to glide right
past each other earlier this month.
In a slow day-by-day march,
Jupiter sank into the sunset horizon
while Venus remained high and bright.
The conjunction ended the
five-planet party
visible over the last two months.
Jupiter, of course,
is much further away from the
Earth and
Sun than
Venus, so the passing was really just an
angular illusion.
Pictured above on June 3, a fading sunset finds
Venus shining over Jupiter above clouds, mountains, and the city lights of
Belfast,
Northern Ireland.
APOD: 2002 June 21 - Zimbabwe Sunset
Explanation:
Today's scheduled geocentric astronomical
event is the Solstice, with the
Sun reaching its northernmost
declination at 13 hours 24 minutes
Universal Time.
For denizens of planet Earth this Solstice
marks the beginning of
Summer in the northern
hemisphere and Winter in
the south.
Of course,
the
tilt of the Earth's axis of rotation
(and not
a change in the Earth-Sun distance) is mainly responsible for the changing
seasons and the Sun's yearly north-south motion through the sky.
Following the rising
and setting points of the Sun along
the horizon is one way to track
the Sun's progress along its
seasonal cycle.
Tall grasses and tinted clouds frame this dramatic view of
the setting Sun approaching the northern limit of this year's
seasonal journey as seen near Raffingora,
Zimbabwe.
APOD: 2002 May 16 - Double Trouble Solar Bubbles
Explanation:
During April and May, attention has been focused on the
western evening sky,
presenting its spectacle of bright planets and crescent
moons shortly after sunset.
Meanwhile,
the Sun itself has
not been just sinking quietly below the horizon.
For example on May 2nd,
two enormous clouds of energetic particles blasted
away from the solar surface in nearly simultaneous eruptions.
Known as
coronal mass ejections
(CMEs), they appear as large "bubbles"
oriented at about 2 o'clock and 8 o'clock
in this composite image from cameras onboard
the sun-staring SOHO spacecraft.
At picture center, an extreme ultraviolet image of the Sun recorded near
the time of these eruptions has been superimposed for scale.
The blank region surrounding it corresponds to an occulting disk
in one of SOHO's coronagraphic cameras.
Speeding outward
at millions of kilometers per hour,
these two CMEs missed our
fair planet.
But those that do impact Earth's
magnetosphere often trigger
auroral displays and disruptions.
APOD: 2002 May 10 - Trailing Planets
Explanation:
Positioning his camera and tripod on
planet Earth,
near Maricopa, Arizona, USA,
astrophotographer
Joe Orman created this trailing display of the ongoing
sky-full-of-planets
on May 3rd.
He initially captured the grouping in a 20 second
long time exposure
recording the positions of the bright planets and stars.
Covering the camera lens for five minutes, he then exposed the same
frame for 45 minutes,
tracing the gentle arcs of the celestial
wanderers
as the Earth's rotation carried them toward the western
horizon.
Of course these planets,
Mercury,
Venus,
Mars,
Jupiter, and
Saturn all
still dazzle
in western skies near sunset,
but sky gazers who want to see Mercury should look soon.
Mercury starts the evening closest to the horizon -
visible here
above the wide bright trail left by Venus - and in the coming days
Mercury will be the first to leave the evening sky entirely as it moves
closer to the setting Sun.
Tonight Venus and Mars
will appear very close
together, separated by only one third of a degree.
APOD: 2002 May 9 - Planets Over Stonehenge
Explanation:
Stonehenge,
four thousand year old monument
to the Sun,
provides an appropriate setting for
this delightful snapshot
of the
Sun's children
gathering in planet Earth's sky.
While the
massive stone
structure dates from around 2000
B.C.,
this arrangement of
the visible planets was
recorded only a few days ago on the evening of May 4th, 2002 A.D.
Bright Jupiter stands highest above the horizon at the upper left.
A remarkable, almost
equilateral triangle
formed by Saturn (left),
Mars (top), and Venus (right) is placed just above the stones
near picture center.
Fighting the glow of the setting sun, Mercury can be spotted closest
to the horizon, below and right of the planetary triad.
Still
easy to enjoy for casual sky gazers, this photogenic and slowly shifting
planetary grouping
will be joined by a young crescent
Moon beginning Monday, May 13.
APOD: 2002 May 8 - Sunspot Loops in Ultraviolet
Explanation:
It was a quiet day on the
Sun.
The above image shows, however, that even during off days the
Sun's surface is a busy place.
Shown in ultraviolet light, the relatively
cool dark regions have temperatures of thousands of degrees
Celsius.
Large sunspot group AR 9169 is
visible as the bright area near the horizon.
The bright glowing gas flowing around the
sunspots
has a temperature of over one million degrees
Celsius.
The reason for the high temperatures is
unknown
but thought to be related to the rapidly changing
magnetic field loops that channel solar plasma.
Sunspot group AR 9169
moved across the Sun during 2000 September and
decayed in a few weeks.
APOD: 2002 April 4 - Ikeya-Zhang: Comet Over Colorado
Explanation:
Comet
Ikeya-Zhang ("ee-KAY-uh JONG") has become
a most photogenic comet.
This lovely early evening view of
the comet
in Rocky Mountain skies
looks northwest over ridges and low clouds.
The time exposure was recorded on March 31st from
an 8,000 foot elevation near Yampa, Colorado, USA.
Sporting
a sweeping yellowish dust
tail
and blue ion
tail eight to
ten degrees long, Ikeya-Zhang is nestled near the horizon in the
northern constellation of
Andromeda.
To the comet's left is the bright star
Mirach
or Beta Andromedae while the stretched celestial fuzzball to the
comet's right is M31 or the
Andromeda galaxy, the nearest bright
spiral galaxy to our own Milky Way.
As the days pass, Comet Ikeya-Zhang's
apparent motion
through the sky is towards the right in this image.
Tonight,
comet-watchers
blessed with clear skies should find Ikeya-Zhang
posing perfectly
for binoculars and cameras just above M31, less than two degrees
from the center of the bright galaxy.
APOD: 2002 March 10 - A Southern Sky View
Explanation:
On 1996 March 22, a Galaxy and a comet shared the southern sky.
They were captured together, from horizon to horizon, in the night sky above Loomberah, New South Wales,
Australia by astronomer
Gordon Garradd.
Garradd used a home made all-sky camera with a
fisheye lens, resulting in a circular 200 degree field of view.
This gorgeous sky view was dominated by the luminous band of our
Milky Way Galaxy cut by dramatic, dark
interstellar dust clouds.
Along with the bright stars of our Galaxy, the
Large Magellanic Cloud
is visible at the lower left.
That night sky was also graced by the long, lovely, bluish tail of
Comet Hyakutake,
which can be seen toward the top of the image,
near the bright star
Arcturus.
Bright city lights from nearby
Tamworth glow along the Northwestern horizon.
APOD: 2002 February 27 - A Cloud Shadow Sunrise
Explanation:
What could cause a ray of dark?
Such a ray was
caught in spectacular fashion above the
Florida Everglades
two years ago.
The cause is something surprisingly familiar: a
shadow.
The gold-tinged cloud near the horizon
blocks sunlight from
reflecting off air behind the cloud,
making that column of air appear
unusually dark.
Cloud shadows can be thought of the
inverse of the more commonly highlighted
crepuscular rays, where
sunlight pours though cloud holes.
Another seemingly opposite phenomenon, a
sun pillar, involves small
ice crystals floating high in the atmosphere.
APOD: 2002 February 21 - Comet Ikeya-Zhang
Explanation:
Comet
Ikeya-Zhang
is presently heading north in planet
Earth's sky,
framed by stars of the constellation Cetus.
The comet was
discovered as a faint,
telescopic
object near the western
horizon on the evening of February 1st independently by
Kaoru Ikeya of Shizuoka prefecture, Japan,
Daqing Zhang in Henan province, China, and
later by
observer Paulo Raymundo of Salvador, Brazil.
But Ikeya-Zhang
is expected to brighten significantly and in March and
April could become visible to the unaided eye.
This picture, taken near Tucson, Arizona, USA on the evening of
February 9th, covers a field a bit less than the width of the full moon
showing the comet's
condensed coma and narrow, developing
tail.
Ikeya-Zhang should pass closest to the Sun (perihelion) on March 18 at
a point roughly midway between the orbits of
Mercury and Venus.
Based on preliminary calculations of this comet's orbit,
Ikeya-Zhang is
suspected of being a periodic comet, returning to the inner
Solar System every 500 years or so.
In fact, it is speculated that Ikeya-Zhang may be directly connected
with a historic
bright comet seen in 1532.
APOD: 2002 February 9 - Moon Over Mongolia
Explanation:
Fighting clouds and the glow of city lights,
a young Moon shines over the western horizon of
Mongolia's capital,
Ulaan-Baatar.
The thin
sunlit
crescent is about 2 days old and strongly over exposed in this
image taken on March 10, 1997.
The night side of the Moon is also visible due to
earthshine -
sunlight reflected from the Earth to the Moon.
Just below the Moon,
bright Saturn shines through the clouds.
Skygazers
will have a chance to watch the Moon actually
pass in front of the
ringed planet in February, March, and April
this year.
In fact, an excellent lunar occultation of Saturn will
be visible from parts of North America
on February 20th
as Saturn disappears behind the dark limb of a first quarter
Moon.
Some may even take this opportunity to search for
Saturn's lost ring.
APOD: 2002 January 30 - Moonrise Over Seattle
Explanation:
Is the Moon larger when near the horizon?
No -- as shown above, the
Moon
appears to be very nearly the same size no matter
its location on the sky.
Oddly, the cause or causes for the common
Moon Illusion are still being debated.
Two leading explanations both hinge on the
illusion that foreground objects make a
horizon Moon
seem farther in the distance.
The historically most popular explanation then holds that the
mind interprets more distant objects as wider, while a
more recent explanation adds that the distance illusion
may actually make the eye focus differently.
Either way, the
angular diameter of the Moon is always about 0.5
degrees.
In the above time-lapse sequence taken near the end of last year,
the Moon was briefly re-imaged every 2.5 minutes,
with the last exposure of longer duration to bring up a
magnificent panorama of the city of
Seattle.
APOD: 2002 January 9 - Blue Flash
Explanation:
Difficult to observe, the momentary
green flash above
the rising or setting sun
has been documented as
a phenomenon caused by the atmospheric
bending or refraction of sunlight.
Like a weak prism, the Earth's atmosphere breaks
white sunlight into
colors, bending red colors slightly and green and blue colors
through increasingly larger angles.
When the sky is clear, a
green flash just above the sun's edge
can sometimes be seen for a second or so, when the sun is
close to a distant horizon.
A blue flash is even harder to see though, because
the atmosphere
must be extraordinarily clear to avoid scattering
and diminishing the refracted blue sunlight.
Still, from a site near
Roques de los Muchachos (altitude 2,400 meters) on La Palma
in the Canary Islands,
astrophotographer Mario Cogo captured this dramatic telescopic image of
a blue flash on color film in October of 2001.
The image of the setting Sun with large
sunspot groups
on its surface is heavily distorted by atmospheric layers.
A lingering green rim is just visible under the tantalizing
blue flash.
APOD: 2001 December 26 - Himalayan Horizon From Space
Explanation:
This
stunning aerial view shows the rugged snow covered
peaks of
a Himalayan mountain range in Nepal.
The seventh-highest peak on the planet, Dhaulagiri,
is the high point
on the horizon at the left while
in the foreground lies the southern Tibetan Plateau of China.
But, contrary to appearances, this picture wasn't taken from
an airliner cruising at 30,000 feet.
Instead it was taken with a 35mm camera and telephoto lens by the
Expedition 1 crew aboard the
International Space Station --
orbiting 200 nautical
miles above the Earth.
The Himalayan mountains
were created by crustal plate tectonics
on planet Earth
some 70 million years ago, as the Indian plate began a
collision with the Eurasian plate.
Himalayan uplift still continues today at a rate of a
few millimeters per year.
APOD: 2001 December 9 - The Belt of Venus
Explanation:
Although you've surely seen it, you might not have noticed it.
During a cloudless
twilight, just before sunrise or after sunset, part of the atmosphere above the
horizon appears slightly off-color, slightly pink.
Visible in the
above photograph, this off-color band between the
dark eclipsed sky and the
blue sky can best be seen in the direction opposite the Sun
and is called the Belt of
Venus.
Straight above,
blue sky is normal sunlight reflecting off the atmosphere.
In the Belt of Venus, however, the atmosphere reflects light
from the
setting (or rising) Sun which
appears more red.
The Belt of Venus can be seen from any location
with a clear horizon.
It is frequently
caught
by
accident
in
other
photographs.
APOD: 2001 October 30 - Anticrepuscular Rays Over Colorado
Explanation:
What's happening over the horizon?
Although the scene may appear somehow
supernatural,
nothing more unusual is occurring than a
setting Sun and some well placed clouds.
Pictured above are
anticrepuscular rays.
To understand them, start by picturing common
crepuscular rays that are seen any time that sunlight pours though scattered clouds.
Now although sunlight indeed travels along
straight lines, the projections of these lines onto the
spherical sky are
great circles.
Therefore, the
crepuscular rays from a
setting (or rising) sun
will appear to re-converge on the other side of the sky.
At the anti-solar point 180 degrees around from the
Sun, they are referred to as
anticrepuscular rays.
Pictured above is a particularly striking set of
anticrepuscular rays photographed earlier this month
from a moving car just outside of Boulder,
Colorado,
USA.
APOD: 2001 September 12 - Zodiacal Light and the False Dawn
Explanation:
An unusual triangle of light will be particularly
bright near the eastern horizon before sunrise
during the next two months for observers in Earth's northern
hemisphere.
Once considered a false dawn, this triangle of light is actually
Zodiacal Light, light reflected from
interplanetary dust particles.
The triangle is clearly visible on the left of the
above frame taken from
Mauna Kea in
Hawaii on August 30 by one of the developing global network of
fisheye nighttime web cameras
called CONCAMs.
Zodiacal dust
orbits the
Sun
predominantly in the same plane as the planets: the
ecliptic.
Indeed, the triangle points to bright spots
Jupiter and Saturn,
with Saturn nearer the center.
Zodiacal light is so bright this time of year because the
dust band is oriented
nearly vertical at sunrise,
so that the thick air near the horizon does not
block
out relatively bright
reflecting dust.
Zodiacal light is also bright for
people in Earth's northern hemisphere
in March and April just after sunset.
APOD: 2001 August 18 - Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
Explanation:
Mars,
the red planet named for
the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons,
Phobos and
Deimos,
whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic.
These
Martian
moons may well be captured
asteroids
originating in the main asteroid belt between Mars
and Jupiter or perhaps from even more
distant reaches of the
Solar System.
In this 1978
Viking 1 orbiter image,
the largest moon, Phobos, is indeed seen to be a
heavily cratered asteroid-like object.
About 17 miles across, Phobos really
zips through the Martian sky.
Actually rising above Mars' western horizon and setting in the east,
it completes an orbit in less than 8 hours.
But Phobos is doomed.
Phobos orbits so close to Mars,
(about 3,600 miles above the surface compared to 250,000 miles for
our Moon)
that gravitational tidal forces are dragging it down.
In 100 million
years or so it will likely crash into the surface or be shattered by stress
caused by the
relentless
tidal forces, the debris forming a ring around Mars.
APOD: 2001 August 7 - A July Dawn
Explanation:
Those up before dawn in late July in the
northern hemisphere could
see planets, stars, and a spacecraft in a
single quick glance before starting their day.
Near the eastern horizon was bright
Jupiter, and not far above and to its right was the very bright
Venus.
Connecting the dots will point you just right of
Saturn.
Far in the distance but near the top right of the frame
is the Pleiades star cluster.
Orbiting the
Earth well in the foreground, the
International Space Station
reflected sunlight to cause the faint line segment.
In the very close foreground, the bright red and yellow lines
were caused by a passing van.
The above picture was taken on July 26 from
Quebec,
Canada.
Why are bushes
visible through the van?
The van was present for only a few of the
25 seconds of the total exposure.
APOD: 2001 June 27 - Moonlight, Mars and Milky Way
Explanation:
Aloha
and welcome to a breath-taking skyscape.
In this celestial scene,
a four day old Moon illuminates a dreamlike foreground while
bright planet Mars
(above center) rules and
the
Milky Way's cosmic clouds of stars and dust seem to stretch
from horizon to horizon.
The picture was taken on May 27th from what may be the best
amateur astronomy observing site
on planet Earth, near the
Mauna Kea, Hawai'i
Visitor Center, 9,600 feet above sea level.
Remarkable in the volcanic foreground are moonlit clouds and
an "ahu hoku" - a star marker or star altar - built up of rocks
topped with a white piece of coral gently glowing in the moonlight.
Now near its closest approach in 13 years,
Mars still lingers between the
Milky Way constellations of
Sagittarius and Scorpius.
High above the horizon by midnight,
the Red Planet is
exceptionally well placed for
earthdwellers to admire it.
Astrophotographer
Barney Magrath
comments that this splendid sky view
represents one of the joys of
photography itself.
When making the time exposure he did not realize that the
ahu hoku would become such a beautiful element in his celestial
composition.
APOD: 2001 June 1 - Venus' Evening Loop
Explanation:
From September 2000 through March 2001, astronomer Tunc Tezel
patiently photographed the planet Venus on 25 different dates
as it wandered through the evening twilight.
The pictures were taken from the same spot on the campus of
the Middle East Technical University near Ankara, Turkey, and
timed so that for each photo
the
Sun was 7 degrees below the horizon.
Carefully registering and combining the pictures, he produced
this composite image -- a stunning demonstration of
Venus' grand looping
sky motion
during its recent stint as planet Earth's
evening star.
As indicated, the first picture, taken September 28, 2000,
finds Venus close to the western
horizon and drifting south (left)
with the passing days.
By December however, Venus
was climbing well above the horizon after sunset and
in January 2001 it reached its maximum apparent distance
(elongation) from the Sun.
March found Venus falling from
the evening sky while
moving rapidly north, finally appearing (far right) as
a faint dot against the sunset glow on March 24.
This month, Venus rises before dawn as the brilliant
morning star.
APOD: 2001 May 12 - Shuttle Moon
Explanation:
As a gorgeous full Moon rose
above the eastern horizon on February 7,
the Space Shuttle Atlantis streaked skyward towards an orbital
rendezvous with the
International Space Station.
Watching from Orlando, Florida, about 60 miles west of the
Kennedy Space Center
launch site, photographer Tony DeVito captured this digital image,
one of a series
of pictures of the shuttle's fiery climb.
While foreground street lights flickered on and a clear evening
sky grew dark, the shuttle's path just grazed the bright lunar disk.
On this mission, STS-98, Atlantis carried the U.S.
Destiny laboratory
module to be added to the expanding orbital outpost.
Atlantis
is currently scheduled to return to the space station next month.
APOD: 2001 March 30 - Equinox + 1
Explanation:
Twice a year, at the Spring and Fall equinox,
the Sun rises due east.
In an emphatic demonstration of this
celestial alignment,
photographer Joe Orman recorded this
inspiring image of the Sun rising
exactly along the east-west oriented Western Canal, in Tempe,
Arizona, USA.
But he waited until March 21st, one day after the equinox, to
photograph the striking view.
Why was the rising Sun due east one day after the equinox?
At Tempe's latitude the Sun rises
at an angle, arcing southward as
it climbs above the horizon.
Because the distant mountains hide the true horizon, the Sun shifts
slightly southward by the time it clears the
mountain tops.
Waiting 24 hours
allowed the Sun
to rise just north
of east and arc back to an exactly eastern alignment for the photo.
Orman also notes that this picture carries a special significance as
we experience the maximum of the
solar activity cycle.
The electricity and telephone transmission lines along the canal symbolize
power and communications grids which are most vulnerable
to outbursts from
the active Sun.
APOD: 2001 March 23 - Mir Flares Farewell
Explanation:
Streaking low
across the western horizon after sunset, the Russian
Mir
space station makes a final pass through the evening sky above the
coastal city of Salvador, Brazil.
In this 5 minute 20 second time exposure made with
ASA 800 film and a wide-angle lens on March 19,
setting stars leave short, almost vertical
trails.
A rapidly moving Mir travels horizontally, trailing toward the left
(south) edge of the picture.
Reflecting sunlight from low Earth orbit, the
historic
space station chanced to produce
a "farewell" flare near the
end of its visible track.
As if in poignant response, the
Hubble
Space Telescope appeared in
Brazilian skies within a minute after
Mir's passage and also left a
flare along a trail moving toward the top of the picture.
Lights visible
on the horizon are from nearby Itaparica Island.
After 15 years in service, the
long-lived
Mir space station was safely
deorbited today.
The splashdown of its surviving pieces occurred in a remote area
of the South Pacific Ocean.
APOD: 2001 March 22 - Jupiter, Saturn and Messier 45
Explanation:
Brilliant Venus falls out
of the evening sky as March ends,
but Jupiter and Saturn remain well up above the
western horizon.
Jupiter
blazes forth above and to the left of a slightly fainter
Saturn in this
telephoto picture taken on January 19th.
Near the top lies the lovely Pleiades
star cluster with suggestions of its characteristic blue
reflection nebulae.
These planets and the Pleiades have a similar, easily recognizable
orientation in the Spring night sky.
Also known as
M45,
the 45th object in French astronomer Charles
Messier's famous catalog, the Pleiades will likely soon be
checked off many stargazers' tally lists.
For northern hemisphere observers this weekend offers a
prime opportunity to complete a
Messier Marathon -- the
viewing of all 110 Messier
catalog
objects in one glorious
dusk to dawn observing run.
This weekend it will also be possible to complete an all-planet
marathon, observing all the
solar system's planets
in a single night.
And if you still need something to look at, the
International Space Station
could also be visible arcing through the skies depending on
your location, but Mir will
not.
APOD: 2001 March 20 - Discovery Spring
Explanation:
Welcome to the
equinox!
Moving northward in Earth's sky, today
the Sun crosses the celestial
equator at 13:31
Universal
Time bringing Spring to the north and Fall to the south.
The change of season is known as an equinox as
the Sun rises due
east on the horizon and sets due west -- providing an
equal night, 12 night and 12 daylight hours,
for both northern and southern hemispheres.
In this picture from March 8, the Sun peers
over the eastern horizon at the space shuttle Discovery's
dramatic morning launch on mission STS-102.
Having delivered supplies and taxied crew to the
International Space Station,
Discovery will remain in orbit for this
first day of northern hemisphere Spring.
Discovery is scheduled
to
land at
Kennedy Space Center
in Florida early tomorrow.
APOD: 2001 March 8 - Bright Venus
Explanation:
Have you seen a bright evening star
in the western sky lately?
That's no star, that's planet Venus the second "rock"
from the Sun.
Blazing at -4.6
magnitude, Venus, after the Sun and Moon,
is the third brightest celestial body in
planet Earth's sky.
Venus is closer to the Sun than Earth and
as Venus orbits
the Sun it is seen to go through
phases similar to the Moon.
But unlike the Moon, as
Venus waxes and wanes
its distance from Earth and hence its apparent size changes drastically.
This causes
Venus to look brighter
as it looms large in its
crescent phases than when it is smaller and nearly full.
Taken on January 28th, this dramatic picture finds a crescent
Venus near its brightest to the right of a crescent Moon.
The brilliant rivals seem poised above a satellite dish of the
Scripps Satellite Oceanography Facility.
Closer to the horizon,
just below and to the right of the satellite dish,
Mercury pierces the twilight glow.
APOD: 2001 February 19 - Shuttle Plume Shadow Points to Moon
Explanation:
Why would the shadow of a
space shuttle
launch plume point toward the Moon?
Two weeks ago during the launch of
Atlantis, the
Sun,
Earth,
Moon,
and rocket were all properly aligned for
this photogenic coincidence.
First, for the
space shuttle's plume to cast a long shadow,
the time of day must be either near
sunrise or
sunset.
Next, just at sunset, the
shadow
is the longest and extends all the way to the
horizon.
Finally, during a
Full Moon, the
Sun and
Moon are on
opposite sides of the sky.
Just after
sunset, for example,
the Sun is slightly below the
horizon, and,
in the other direction,
the Moon is slightly above the
horizon.
Therefore, as
Atlantis blasted off, just after
sunset,
its shadow projected away from the Sun
toward the opposite horizon, where the
Full Moon just happened to be.
APOD: 2001 February 10 - Aurora Astern
Explanation:
Sailing
upside down, 115
nautical
miles above Earth, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavour
made this spectacular time exposure of the southern
aurora (aurora australis) in October of 1994.
Aurora,
also known as the northern and southern lights,
appear as luminous bands or streamers of light
which can extend to altitudes of 200 miles.
They are typically visible from the Earth's surface at high latitudes and
are triggered by high energy particles from the Sun.
The delicate colors are caused by energetic electrons colliding with
oxygen and nitrogen molecules in the upper atmosphere.
In this picture, the rear
structure of the shuttle Endeavour is in the foreground with
the vertical tail fin pointed toward Earth.
Star trails
are the short streaks above Earth's horizon.
APOD: 2001 January 19 - Black Holes Are Black
Explanation:
Q: Why are
black holes black?
A: Because they have an
event horizon.
The event horizon is that one-way boundary predicted by
general
relativity beyond which nothing, not even light, can return.
X-ray
astronomers using the space-based Chandra Observatory now
believe they have direct evidence for event horizons - therefore
black holes - in binary star systems which can be
detected in x-ray light.
These binaries, sometimes called x-ray novae, are
known to consist of relatively normal stars dumping
material on to massive, compact companions.
As illustrated,
the material swirls toward the companion in an
accretion disk which itself glows in x-rays.
If the compact companion is a neutron star
(right), the material ultimately smashes into the solid surface
and glows even more brightly in high energy x-rays.
But if it is indeed a
black hole with a defining event
horizon, then the x-ray hot material approaches the speed of
light as it swirls past the surface of no
return and is lost from view.
Recent
work describes observations of two classes of
x-ray binaries,
one class 100 times fainter than the other.
The results imply the presence of an event horizon in the
fainter class which causes the extreme difference in x-ray
brightness.
APOD: 2000 November 8 - October Skylights
Explanation:
With brilliant
Venus above the western horizon at sunset and
Jupiter and
Saturn
high in the east by early evening,
November's night sky is filled with bright planets.
October's sky featured bright planets as well and, triggered
by the active Sun, some lovely
auroral displays.
This colorful aurora was recorded by
astrophotographer Wade Clark in skies
above Hamilton, Washington, USA on the night of October 4th.
Through the shimmering
northern lights Jupiter and Saturn
are easy to spot flanking the
V-shaped head of
Taurus the Bull.
Of course, just above lies the lovely Pleiades star cluster.
Solar activity will
also produce auroral shows in November,
particularly at high northern and southern latitudes.
Plus, November skygazers can certainly anticipate a celestial
performance on the evening of the 17th/18th -- the
moonlit
Leonid meteor shower.
APOD: 2000 September 12 - Slightly Above Mars Pathfinder
Explanation: If you could have hovered above the
Pathfinder mission to
Mars in 1997, this is what you might have seen.
Directly below you is the control tower of
Sagan
Memorial Station.
Three dark solar arrays extend out to collect valuable energy,
surrounded by light-colored deflated airbags that protected Pathfinder's instruments from directly colliding with the rocky Martian surface.
The left
solar panel has ramps down which
Pathfinder's
rolling robot
Sojourner started its adventure to nearby rocks.
Sojourner itself is visible
inspecting a rock nicknamed
Yogi at 11 o'clock.
Rocks cover the
Martian surface, with
Twin Peaks
visible on the horizon at 9 0'clock.
The distant sky is mostly orange.
This image is a recently released digital combination of
panoramic pictures
taken by Pathfinder on Mars and a picture of a
Lander scale model back on Earth.
The Mars Pathfinder Mission was able to
collect data for three months, sending back information
that has indicated a wet distant past for Mars.
APOD: 2000 July 28 - Moon And Venus Share The Sky
Explanation:
July is drawing to a close and in the past few days,
some early morning risers could have
looked east and seen a crescent Moon
sharing the pre-dawn skies with planets Jupiter and Saturn.
Planet Mercury will also pass
about 2 degrees from
the thin waning crescent
Moon
just before sunrise near the eastern horizon
on Saturday, July 29.
And finally, on the evening of July 31st, Venus will take its turn
near the crescent Moon.
But this time it will be a day-old crescent Moon near the western horizon,
shortly after sunset.
In
fact, on July 31 (August 1 Universal Time)
the Moon will occult
(pass in front of) Venus for
northwestern observers in North America.
This telescopic picture taken on 31 December 1997, shows a lovely young
crescent Moon and brilliant crescent
Venus in the early evening sky near
Bursa,
Turkey.
And what about the Sun? On Sunday, July 30, a
partial eclipse of the Sun will be visible from
some locations in North America.
APOD: 2000 July 21 - Eros Craters And Boulders
Explanation:
From a
delicate orbit around asteroid 433 Eros,
the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft's camera has now imaged the entire surface
of the
small
oddly-shaped world at least once.
Recorded on July 7th from a distance of 50 kilometers,
this
dramatic view is about 1.8 kilometers across.
It shows the walls and rims of two large overlapping
impact craters on the horizon.
Massive boulders which may be debris from the impacts are
perched along the crater edges.
The prominent boulder on the
horizon near picture center is about
40 meters long.
In fact, the NEAR mission
to Eros
has shown that along with
craters and boulders, grooves and ridges
are also common on the
asteroid's surface.
While the craters are clearly of impact origin,
puzzles about the other surface features still remain.
On July 13, controllers fired the spacecraft thrusters and
moved
NEAR Shoemaker to an even
closer 35
kilometer orbit to enable higher resolution surface studies.
APOD: 2000 May 25 - Eros Horizon View
Explanation:
Since April 30,
the robotic NEAR-Shoemaker
spacecraft
has been orbiting only 31 miles from
asteroid Eros.
Cruising over the
asteroid's north
and south poles at a leisurely 7 miles
per hour, the spacecraft completes
an
orbit once every 1.2 earth days.
This dramatic horizon view recorded by the spacecraft's camera
on May 18 spans about 0.8 miles and reveals features as
small as 13 feet across.
Emphasized by long, harsh shadows produced
by the low sun angle, the rolling
surface of Eros is seen to be strewn with boulders and craters with a range
of sizes.
The jagged-looking boulder near the picture center is over 190 feet tall.
While gathering sharp pictures of Eros' surface,
experimenters will also
take advantage of
the
close orbit
to explore the asteroid's surface composition and
internal structure, and search for a magnetic field.
APOD: 2000 May 7 - A Green Flash from the Sun
Explanation:
Many think it is just a myth.
Others think it is true but its cause isn't known.
Adventurers pride themselves on having seen it.
It's a green flash from the Sun.
The truth is the
green flash
does exist and its cause is well understood.
Just as the setting
Sun disappears completely from view,
a last glimmer appears startlingly green.
The effect is typically visible only from locations with a low,
distant horizon, and lasts just a few seconds. A green flash is also visible for a rising
Sun, but takes better timing to spot.
A slight variant of this was caught in the
above photograph, where much of the
Sun was still visible,
but the very top appeared momentarily green. The
Sun itself does not turn
partly green, the effect is caused by layers of the
Earth's atmosphere acting like a prism.
APOD: 2000 March 20 - Mercury on the Horizon
Explanation:
Have you ever seen the planet Mercury?
Because
Mercury orbits so close to the Sun,
it is never seen far from the Sun,
and so is only visible near
sunrise or
sunset.
If trailing the Sun,
Mercury will be visible
for several minutes before it follows the
Sun behind the
Earth.
If leading the Sun,
Mercury will be
visible for only several minutes before the
Sun rises and hides it with increasing glare.
An
informed skygazer can usually pick Mercury out of a dark
horizon glow
with little more than determination.
Above, a lot of determination has been combined
with a little
digital trickery to
show Mercury's successive positions
during the middle of last month.
Each picture was taken from the same location in Spain
when the Sun was 10 degrees below the
horizon and superposed
on the single most
photogenic sunset.
APOD: 2000 February 13 - Southwest Mercury
Explanation:
The planet Mercury resembles a moon. Mercury's old surface is heavily cratered like many moons.
Mercury is larger than most moons but smaller than
Jupiter's moon
Ganymede and
Saturn's moon
Titan.
Mercury is much denser and more massive than any moon,
though, because it is made mostly of iron. In fact, the
Earth is the only planet more dense.
A visitor to Mercury's surface
would see some strange sights.
Because
Mercury rotates exactly three times every two orbits around the
Sun, and because
Mercury's orbit is so elliptical, a visitor to
Mercury might see the
Sun rise, stop in the sky, go back toward the rising
horizon,
stop again, and then set quickly over the other horizon.
From
Earth, Mercury's proximity to the
Sun cause it to be
visible only for a short time just after sunset or just before sunrise.
APOD: 2000 January 5 - Earth, Moon, Hubble
Explanation:
The Space Shuttle Discovery Crew was fortunate
enough to witness one of the brighter full moon's
from orbit two weeks ago during their mission to fix the
Hubble Space Telescope.
Pictured on the left, the
horizon of the Earth
is visible below this full
Moon, which is below the edge of the
Hubble Space Telescope.
The
full Moon on this day, last December 22,
was a few percent
brighter than average because
it was full at nearly the same time it was at
its closest to the Earth, which comes at a time when the
Earth is relatively close to the Sun.
The Shuttle Crew
successfully showered Hubble with needed holiday gifts,
including six new
gyroscopes, a
new computer, and new
batteries.
APOD: November 10, 1999 - The Belt of Venus
Explanation:
Although you've surely seen it, you might not have noticed it.
During a cloudless
twilight, just before sunrise or after sunset, part of the atmosphere above the
horizon appears slightly off-color, slightly pink.
Visible in the
above photograph, this off-color band between the
dark eclipsed sky and the
blue sky can best be seen in the direction opposite the Sun
and is called the Belt of
Venus.
Straight above,
blue sky is normal sunlight reflecting off the atmosphere.
In the Belt of Venus, however, the atmosphere reflects light
from the
setting (or rising) Sun which
appears more red.
The Belt of Venus can be seen from any location
with a clear horizon.
APOD: November 5, 1999 - Shadow Of Phobos
Explanation:
Hurtling through space above the Red Planet,
potato-shaped Phobos completes an orbit of Mars
in less than eight hours.
In fact, since its orbital period is shorter than
the planet's rotation period,
Mars-based observers
see Phobos rise in the west and set in the east -
traveling from horizon to horizon in about 5 1/2 hours.
These three images from the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS)
spacecraft
record the oval
shadow of Phobos racing over
western Xanthe Terra on August 26, 1999.
The area imaged is about 250 kilometers across and is seen
in panels from left to right as
red filter, blue filter, and combined color composite views
from the MGS wide-angle camera system.
The three dark spots most easily seen in the red
image are likely small fields of dark sand dunes on crater floors.
Standing in the shadow of Phobos, you would see
the Martian version of a solar eclipse!
APOD: September 3, 1999 - Venus Falls Out of the Evening Sky
Explanation:
Orbiting closer to the Sun than planet Earth,
bright Venus
always appears to be near the Sun's position
in our sky and
often shines near the
horizon in
twilight hours.
In fact, after posing as the brilliant
evening star
for the first half of this year, Venus has now
swung around its orbit and is emerging in the predawn twilight as the
morning star.
Taken during its stint as the evening star, this
imaginative long-exposure photo,
of Venus and a 2-day-old crescent Moon gives the
illusion of the pair "falling out" of the western sky.
After an initial short exposure captured the Moon and
Venus, the lens was covered for a few minutes, then left uncovered to
record the
trails until the Moon had set.
APOD: July 14, 1999 - Moon, Planets, and Rocket Trails
Explanation:
Are you an
early riser?
Over the last month or so, the
bright planets Jupiter and Saturn have
come to adorn eastern skies before
sunrise.
In fact,
astrophotographer Joe Orman anticipated that an early bird's
reward for looking east on June 10 would be this pleasing
arrangement of Jupiter (top right), a crescent Moon, and
Saturn (near center),
but he was surprised to also find these
eerie, iridescent clouds wafting through the pre-dawn sky over
suburban Phoenix, Arizona, USA.
The clouds turned out to be
rocket
engine
trails from
defense missile tests at the range in
White Sands, New Mexico ... about 300 miles away.
While the
Moon's phase is just past
new moon,
gone now from the pre-dawn horizon, brilliant
Jupiter and
Saturn can still be seen high toward the southeast in the
constellation Aries.
APOD: June 19, 1999 - Venus on the Horizon
Explanation:
Venus can appear as a brilliant evening star.
Besides the sun and moon,
Venus is the brightest object visible in Earth's sky.
Because it is closer to the sun than Earth, Venus never strays far
from the sun in
its apparent position and is seen during the year as either
a bright morning or evening star.
This beautiful sunset imaged from low earth orbit by the
Atlantis space shuttle crew
in May 1989 also reveals the planet Venus blazing above Earth's horizon.
It is a fitting image for this
mission and crew.
It was recorded following the successful release of the
robot Venus-explorer Magellan,
the first planetary probe to be deployed from a space shuttle.
APOD: May 21, 1999 - Star Party Trails
Explanation:
Stargazing is fun!
If you'd like to try it, this weekend may be your chance as many
astronomy clubs and organizations will be
hosting public celebrations of
Astronomy Day on
Saturday, May 22nd.
In recent years, open house nights
at observatories,
astronomy club gatherings, and
star parties have become increasingly popular.
They offer great opportunities for beginners to
view the sky through a variety of telescopes
and veterans to swap
stories and
ideas.
This time exposure of
star trails
was made last month
at the Sentinel, Arizona "Stargaze" star party.
On the right, a
brilliant trail tracks the setting evening star,
Venus.
Stars in Orion
are near the center and bright Sirius
produced the prominent trail at the left.
City lights from nearby Yuma glow on the horizon while
party-goers' red filtered flashlights create
the eerie foreground effect.
The red flashlights are courteously used to
provide a safe level of illumination but
still preserve night
vision for enjoyable stargazing.
APOD: March 25, 1999 - March of the Planets
Explanation:
This March stargazers have been treated to
eye-catching formations of
bright planets in western evening skies.
On March 3rd, looking toward a beautiful sunset from a beach on
the Hawaiian isle of Maui, photographer Rick Scott recorded
this fleeting, four-planet "hockey stick"
array.
Mercury, closest to the horizon and immersed in fading sunlight,
is easily visible between silhouetted clouds.
To the left and up in the deepening blue is Jupiter
with a brilliant Venus above
and Saturn shining in the darkened sky near the top of the image.
The planets are seen to lie close to
the ecliptic - the
apparent path of the sun - which is nearly perpendicular to the
horizon for
Hawaiian latitudes at this time of year.
APOD: March 20, 1999 - Aurora and Orion
Explanation:
Looking toward the south from low Earth orbit, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavor made this stunning time exposure of the
Aurora Australis or southern lights in April of 1994.
Aurora are visible at high
northern latitudes as well, with the northern lights
known as
Aurora Borealis.
They are caused by high energy electrons from the
Solar Wind
which are funneled into the atmosphere near the poles
by the
Earth's magnetic field.
The reddish colors occur at the highest altitudes (about 200 miles)
where the air is least dense. At lower altitudes and greater densities
green tends to dominate ranging to a pinkish glow at the lowest.
The familiar constellation of
Orion the Hunter is clearly
visible above the dark horizon in the background.
Because of the shuttle's orbital motion, the bright stars in
Orion appear slightly elongated.
APOD: February 26, 1998 - A Southern Sky View
Explanation:
From horizon to horizon,
the night sky above Loomberah, New South Wales, Australia
was photographed by astronomer
Gordon Garradd
on March 22, 1996.
Garradd used a home made all-sky camera with a
fish-eye lens,
resulting in a circular 200 degree field of view.
This gorgeous sky view is dominated by the luminous band of
the Milky Way
cut by dramatic, dark interstellar dust clouds.
Along with the bright stars of our Galaxy,
the Large Magellanic Cloud
is visible at the upper right (about 1 o'clock)
and the
long, lovely, bluish tail of
comet Hyakutake can be seen
toward the bottom of the image, near the bright star
Arcturus.
Bright city lights from nearby Tamworth glow along
the Northwestern horizon.
APOD: December 4, 1997 - A Sky Full Of Planets
Explanation:
Look up tonight.
Just after sunset, the crescent moon and
all five "naked-eye" planets
(Mercury,
Venus,
Mars,
Jupiter,
and Saturn)
will be visible (depending on your latitude), lying near
our solar system's ecliptic plane.
Venus and Jupiter will shine brilliantly as the brightest "stars"
in the sky, but Mercury will be near the horizon and hard to see.
A pair of binoculars will also reveal Uranus and Neptune and
observers with a telescope and a good site may even be able
to glimpse faint Pluto just above the
Western horizon in the fading twilight (not shown on the chart above).
Enjoy this lovely spectacle
any clear night through about December 8.
A similar gathering is expected in May 2000
but the planets will be hidden from view by the solar glare.
A night sky as full of planets as this one will occur
again though ... in about 100 years.
APOD: November 16, 1997 - The Leonid Meteor Shower
Explanation:
The Leonid Meteor Shower will likely reach its peak in the
early hours this Monday morning.
Though the Moon will be bright,
Leo,
the shower's radiant point,
will be well above the eastern horizon from Western North America and the
Pacific region during this period.
This year's Leonids may prove particularly
exciting as observers
anticipate the legendary Leonid storm of activity will occur sometime
during the next few apparitions of this annual meteor shower - although
most expect the meteor storm to occur in 1998 or 1999.
Meteor showers result from debris left by passing comets.
The Leonids specifically are small pieces of
Comet Tempel-Tuttle.
In the
above series of time-lapse, 1-minute exposures,
a 1995 Leonid is seen to leave a train of hot air that glowed
persistently for several minutes.
APOD: October 14, 1997 - Venus On The Horizon
Explanation:
The month of October features a sky full of planets, including Venus
as the brilliant evening star.
Besides the sun and moon,
Venus is the brightest object visible in Earth's sky.
This month,
Venus appears in early evening near the
red planet Mars
and Mars' red giant
rival Antares
above the southwestern horizon.
Because it is closer to the sun than Earth, Venus never strays far
from the sun in
its apparent position and is seen during the year as either
a bright morning or evening star.
This beautiful sunset imaged from low earth orbit by the
Atlantis space shuttle crew
in May 1989 also reveals the planet Venus blazing above Earth's horizon.
It is a fitting image for this
mission and crew.
It was recorded following the successful release of the
robot Venus-explorer Magellan,
the first planetary probe to be deployed from a space shuttle.
APOD: September 16, 1997 - Moon Over Mongolia
Explanation:
Fighting clouds and the glow of city lights,
a young Moon shines over the western horizon of
Mongolia's
capital Ulaan-Baatar.
The thin sunlit crescent is 1.5 days old and strongly over exposed in this
image taken on March 10.
The night side of
the moon is also visible due to
Earthshine - sunlight reflected from the Earth
to the Moon.
Just below
the Moon,
bright Saturn shines through the clouds.
Early morning risers can see the Moon near Saturn
this week.
In fact, from North America the Moon can be seen
to pass in front of the ringed planet
on Thursday morning, September 18th.
APOD: September 9, 1997 - A Green Flash from the Sun
Explanation:
Many think it is just a myth.
Others think it is true but its cause isn't known.
Adventurers pride themselves on having seen it. It's a green flash from the
Sun.
The truth is the
green flash does exist and its cause is well understood.
Just as the setting
Sun disappears completely from view,
a last glimmer appears startlingly green.
The effect is typically visible only from locations with a low,
distant horizon, and lasts just a few seconds. A
green flash is also visible for a rising
Sun, but takes better timing to spot.
A slight variant of this was caught in the above photograph,
where much of the
Sun was still visible,
but the very top appeared momentarily green. The
Sun itself does not turn
partly green, the effect is caused by layers of the
Earth's atmosphere acting like a prism.
APOD: August 25, 1997 - A Fisheye View of Comet Hale-Bopp
Explanation:
Thousands of stars, several constellations, a planet and a comet
all graced the western horizon over Ujue,
Spain
just after sunset on April 4th, 1997.
Because the picture was taken with a fisheye lens,
much of the
whole night sky is visible.
Comet Hale-Bopp,
with both tails blazing, appears right of center. The brightest star is
Sirius near the edge, well to the left of the
constellation Orion.
The red star above the
belt
of Orion is
Betelgeuse,
while the red star near the center is
Aldebaran, just to the left of the bright
Pleaides star cluster.
Many other interesting astronomical objects are visible, including
zodiacal light,
which is the diffuse triangular glow in the center.
Even the planet Mercury appears just over the horizon.
APOD: July 24, 1997 - Mars Pathfinder's Landing Site
Explanation:
Where is
Mars Pathfinder?
Follow the arrow in the above picture taken by the
Viking Orbiter
in 1976. From the
surface Mars appears covered with rocks,
but from
orbit Mars appears covered with craters.
However, several familiar features are visible in
this photograph.
To the left (west) of
Sagan Memorial Station
are the now-familiar
twin peaks
that dominate the horizon of
many Pathfinder photographs.
These hills are about one kilometer from the landing site, twice the planned range of
Sojourner.
Two craters loom nearby: a small one to the east not easily visible here,
and a big one to the south of Pathfinder.
The landing site is in the dry flood channel named
Ares Vallis.
APOD: July 14, 1997 - Mars: Twin Peaks In Stereo
Explanation:
Get out your
red/blue glasses and gaze across
the surface of Mars in stereo.
You are looking south of west across an
ancient flood channel, Ares Vallis,
landing site of the
Mars Pathfinder.
A rover deployment ramp and lander petal define the foreground
in this 3D-view while a field of rocks seems to stretch
to the horizon.
At the upper right, over half a mile distant, are the hills known as
the "Twin Peaks".
Today
is Sol 10, the tenth day
the Pathfinder lander and
Sojourner rover have been operating
on the martian surface.
Over that period,
the mission has been returning
a wealth of images and data.
The otherwise successful
rover activities have
been recently hampered
by some communication and computer difficulties.
APOD: January 26, 1997 - Aurora and Orion
Explanation:
Looking toward the south from low Earth orbit, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavor made this stunning time exposure of the
Aurora Australis or southern lights in April of 1994.
Aurora are visible at
high northern latitudes as well, with the northern lights
known as Aurora Borealis.
They are caused by high energy electrons from the
Solar Wind
which are funneled into the atmosphere near the poles
by the
Earth's magnetic field.
The reddish colors occur at the highest altitudes (about 200 miles)
where the air is least dense. At lower altitudes and greater densities
green tends to dominate ranging to a pinkish glow at the lowest.
The familiar constellation of
Orion the Hunter is clearly
visible above the dark horizon in the background.
Because of the shuttle's orbital motion, the bright stars in
Orion appear slightly elongated.
APOD: January 15, 1997 - Black Hole Signature From Advective Disks
Explanation: What does a black hole look like? If alone,
a black hole
would indeed appear
quite black, but many black hole candidates are part of binary star systems.
So how does a black hole binary system
look different from a neutron star binary system?
The above drawings indicate it
is difficult to tell! Recent theoretical work,
however, has provided a new way to tell them apart: advective accretion flows (ADAFs).
A black hole system so equipped
would appear much darker than a similar neutron star
system. The difference is caused by the hot gas from the ADAF disk
falling through the event horizon
of the black hole and disappearing - gas that would have emitted
much light were the central object only a neutron star. Recent observations
of the soft X-ray transient
V404 Cyg
has yielded a spectrum
much like an ADAF onto a black hole
- and perhaps brighter than allowable from an ADAF onto a neutron
star.
APOD: November 30, 1996 - Aurora Astern
Explanation:
Sailing upside down, 115 nautical miles above Earth, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavour
made this spectacular time exposure of the southern
aurora (aurora australis) in October of 1994.
The aurora,
also known as the northern and southern lights,
appear as luminous bands or streamers of light
which can extend to altitudes of 200 miles.
They are typically visible from the Earth's surface at high latitudes and
are caused by
high energy particles from the Sun.
The delicate colors are caused by energetic electrons colliding with
oxygen and nitrogen in the atmosphere.
In this picture, the rear
structure of the Space Shuttle is visible in the foreground with
the vertical tail fin pointed toward Earth.
Star trails
are visible as small streaks above Earth's horizon.
APOD: October 13, 1996 - The Earth Also Rises
Explanation:
The Lunar Orbiter 1 spacecraft was launched in 1966 to
map the lunar surface in
preparation for the
Apollo moon landings.
NASA's plucky robotic explorer performed its job well and pioneered
this classic view of the Earth poised above the lunar horizon. The
first humans to directly witness a
similar scene were the
Apollo 8 astronauts.
As they orbited the Moon in December of 1968 they also recorded
Earth rise in a photograph
that was to become one of the most famous images in history -
a moving portrait of our world from deep space.
APOD: September 13, 1996 - Southwest Mercury
Explanation:
The planet Mercury resembles a moon.
Mercury's
old surface is heavily
cratered like many moons.
Mercury is larger than most moons but smaller than
Jupiter's moon
Ganymede and
Saturn's moon
Titan. Mercury is much denser and more massive than any moon, though, because it is made mostly of iron. In fact, the
Earth is the only planet more dense. A visitor to
Mercury's surface would see some strange sights. Because
Mercuryrotates exactly three times every two orbits around the
Sun, and because
Mercury's orbit is so elliptical, a visitor to
Mercury might see the
Sun rise, stop in the sky, go back toward the rising
horizon, stop again, and then set quickly over the other horizon. From
Earth, Mercury's proximity to the
Sun cause it to be
visible only for a short time just after sunset or just before sunrise.
APOD: April 23, 1996 - Comet Hyakutake on a Starry Night
Explanation:
It was a starry night in April
(April 9th, 1996, 9:32 pm CDT to be exact)
near Lone Jack, Missouri when Comet Hyakutake graced
this astronomically rich field. Making an appearance as the
brilliant evening star, Venus
is overexposed at the far left.
Just below Venus and slightly to the right,
the Pleiades star cluster (M45) glistens.
On the right hand
side of the image, the comet itself shows
a bright blue tail extending
upwards past the nearby star cluster in
the constellation Perseus (top right, the Alpha Persei Group).
Hyakutake, receding from
the Earth and appoaching the Sun, will sink into the western horizon
at sunset in
late April,
disappearing from Northern Hemisphere skies.
APOD: April 18, 1996 - Hyakutake, Venus, Orion, and Pond
Explanation:
Can you find
Comet
Hyakutake in the above picture? In this gorgeous
photo, the starry
night sky of April 9th is pictured with its new comet visitor.
In the foreground is a pond
with the lights of Kansas City, Missouri on the western horizon.
On the upper left, the constellation of
Orion is visible.
At the center, the
brightest object in the picture is the
planet Venus. Venus's reflection
can be seen in the pond. On the right - halfway between Venus and the
photograph's edge - can be seen two bright objects fairly close to each
other. Of these two, look closely at lower right object. See the tail?
Comet Hyakutake is
still visible for Northern observers
in the Western sky and now has begun to
brighten again as it nears the Sun.
APOD: November 14, 1995 - Aurora and Orion
Explanation:
Looking toward the south from low Earth orbit, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavor made this stunning time exposure of the
Aurora Australis (southern lights) in April of 1994.
The aurora
are caused by high energy electrons from the
Solar Wind
which are funneled into the atmosphere
by the
Earth's magnetic field.
The reddish colors occur at the highest altitudes (about 200 miles)
where the air is least dense. At lower altitudes and greater densities
green tends to dominate. At the lowest altitudes a pinkish glow is
sometimes produced.
The familiar
constellation of Orion the Hunter is clearly
visible above the dark horizon in the background.
Because of the shuttle's orbital motion, the bright stars
in
Orion appear slightly elongated.
APOD: October 26, 1995 - Aurora Astern
Explanation:
Sailing upside down, 115 nautical miles above Earth, the crew of the
Space Shuttle Endeavour
made this spectacular time exposure of the southern
aurora (aurora australis) in October of 1994.
The aurora,
also known as the northern
and southern lights, appear as luminous bands or streamers of light
which can extend to altitudes of 200 miles.
They are typically visible from the Earth's surface at high latitudes and
are caused by high energy particles from the Sun.
The delicate colors are caused by energetic electrons colliding with
oxygen and nitrogen in the atmosphere.
In this picture, the rear
structure of the Space Shuttle is visible in the foreground with
the vertical tail fin pointed toward Earth.
Star trails
are visible as small streaks above Earth's horizon.