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Dusty Galaxy, Home to an Exploding Star: The galaxy pictured here is NGC 4424, located in the constellation of Virgo, about 50 million light years from Earth. It is not visible with the naked eye but has been captured here with the Hubble Space Telescope. Although it may not be obvious from this image, NGC 4424 is in fact a spiral galaxy. In this image it is seen more or less edge on, but from above, you would be able to see the arms of the galaxy wrapping around its center to give the characteristic spiral form. In 2012, astronomers observed a supernova in NGC 4424 - a violent explosion marking the end of a star's life. During a supernova explosion, a single star can often outshine an entire galaxy. However, the supernova in NGC 4424, dubbed SN 2012cg, cannot be seen here as the image was taken ten years prior to the explosion. Along the central region of the galaxy, clouds of dust block the light from distant stars and create dark patches. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, Acknowledgement: Gilles Chapdelaine #hubble #nasa #astronomy #space #hst #hubble25 #galaxy #star #supernova #science; -
An Intriguing Member of Black Hole Family Tree: A newly discovered cosmic object may help provide answers to some long-standing questions about how black holes evolve and influence their surroundings, according to a new study using our Chandra X-ray Observatory. Astronomers have been looking very hard for these medium-sized black holes. This object, NGC2276-3c, has traits similar to both stellar-mass black holes and supermassive black holes. In other words, this object helps tie the whole black hole family together. Image Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/M.Mezcua et al & NASA/CXC/INAF/A.Wolter #nasa #space #chandra #astronomy #xray #blackhole #science; -
Selfie on Mars! A sweeping view of the "Pahrump Hills" outcrop on Mars, where our Curiosity rover has been working for five months, surrounds the rover in Curiosity's latest self-portrait. The selfie scene is assembled from dozens of images taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera on the rover's robotic arm. Pahrump Hills is an outcrop of the bedrock that forms the basal layer of Mount Sharp, at the center of Mars' Gale Crater.Curiosity's drill collected the mission's second taste of Mount Sharp. Darker ground at upper right and lower left holds ripples of wind-blown sand and dust. The view does not include the rover's robotic arm. Wrist motions and turret rotations on the arm allowed MAHLI to acquire the mosaic's component images. The arm was positioned out of the shot in the images, or portions of images, that were used in this mosaic. This process was used previously in acquiring and assembling Curiosity self-portraits taken at sample-collection sites "Rock Nest" Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS #nasa #space #mars #curiosity #rover #selfie #science @NASAJPL; -
'Walking' in the vacuum of space, astronaut Terry Virts on the International Space Station (@ISS) is seen working to complete a cable routing task while the sun begins to peak over the Earth's horizon on Feb. 21, 2015. Virts and fellow astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore completed a 6-hour, 41-minute spacewalk routing more than 300 feet of cable as part of a reconfiguration of the station to enable U.S. commercial crew vehicles under development to dock to the space station in the coming years. Virts and Wilmore will start their second spacewalk at 7:10 a.m. EST on Wednesday. Image Credit: NASA #nasa #iss #space #spacestation #astrobutch #exp42 #launchamerica; -
Selfie from space! This is an image of astronaut Barry (Butch) Wilmore from today's spacewalk. His spacewalking partner, Terry Virts, can be seen in the reflection of Wilmore's visor. The duo rigged a series of power and data and routed 340 of 360 feet of cable, which is part of a reconfiguration of station systems and modules to accommodate the delivery of new docking adapters that commercial crew vehicles will use later this decade to deliver astronauts to the orbital laboratory. The duo will venture outside the space station again on Wednesday, Feb. 25, to deploy two more cables and lubricate the end of the space station's robotic arm. Image Credit: NASA #nasa #space #spacestation #iss #launchamerica #isscrew #astrobutch #spacewalk #selfie #USEVA29 #exp42;
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Sparkling Stars: Some cosmic objects move a little further than others - take the subject of this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image, a globular cluster of stars known as Palomar 12. Although it currently lies on the outskirts of the Milky Way's halo, Palomar 12 was not born here. When astronomers first studied this cluster, they were puzzled by its strangely young age when compared to the other clusters in the galaxy. It appeared to be around 30 percent younger than other Milky Way globulars. Surely if it had been born within our galaxy, it would have sprung to life at a similar time to its cluster companions? A bit more digging revealed that Palomar 12 was actually ripped from its initial home, the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical galaxy, around 1.7 billion years ago via tidal interactions between its former home and our galaxy. The dwarf galaxy that Palomar 12 once called home is a satellite galaxy to ours, and closely orbits around us - even occasionally passing through the plane of our galaxy. In fact, it is being slowly torn apart and consumed by the Milky Way. Credit: ESA/NASA #nasa #hst #hubble #hubble25 #space #astronomy #galaxy #science; -
Our Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) and ESA’s (European Space Agency) XMM-Newton telescope are showing that fierce winds from a supermassive black hole blow outward in all directions -- a phenomenon that had been suspected, but difficult to prove until now. This discovery has given astronomers their first opportunity to measure the strength of these ultra-fast winds and prove they are powerful enough to inhibit the host galaxy’s ability to make new stars. Supermassive black holes blast matter into their host galaxies, with X-ray-emitting winds traveling at up to one-third the speed of light. In the new study, astronomers determined PDS 456, an extremely bright black hole known as a quasar more than 2 billion light-years away, sustains winds that carry more energy every second than is emitted by more than a trillion suns. Supermassive black holes at the cores of galaxies blast out radiation and ultra-fast winds, as illustrated in this artist's conception. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech; -
Traveling about 257 miles above the Atlantic Ocean northeast of Puerto Rico, the unpiloted Progress 58 Russian cargo ship docked at 11:57 a.m. EST on Feb. 17 to the rear port of the Zvezda service module of the International Space Station. The craft is delivering three tons of food, fuel, supplies and experiment hardware to the six crew members aboard the orbital laboratory. Progress 58 is scheduled to remain docked to the space station until August. This image was snapped by Samantha Cristoforetti, an Italian European Space Agency astronaut, on Feb. 17 from the space station. She wrote, "Here she comes! Progress #ISScargo craft a few meters from #ISS, she took the parking spot that #ATV5 freed up on Sat." Image Credit: NASA/ESA #nasa #esa #isscargo #space #spacestation #progress #exp42 #roscosmos #rsa #science; -
Happy President's Day! Here's an International Space Station photo of the eastern (Atlantic) coast of the United States, which includes Virginia, where George Washington, the first U.S. president, was born. The image was taken in February 2012 by an Expedition 30 astronaut. Large metropolitan areas and other easily recognizable sites from the Virginia/Maryland/Washington, D.C. area spanning almost to Rhode Island are visible in the scene. Boston is just out of frame at right. Long Island and the Greater Metropolitan area of New York City are visible in the lower right quadrant. Large cities in Pennsylvania (Philadelphia and Pittsburgh) are near center. Parts of two Russian vehicles parked at the orbital outpost are seen in left foreground. Image Credit: NASA #nasa #iss #spacestation #washington #gerogewashington #presidentsday #virginia #space; -
This narrow-angle color image of the Earth, dubbed "Pale Blue Dot," is a part of the first ever "portrait" of the solar system taken by Voyager 1. The images turned 25 Saturday. The late Carl Sagan, a member of the Voyager imaging team at the time, had the idea of pointing the spacecraft back toward its home for a last look. Sagan wrote in his "Pale Blue Dot" book: "That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. ... There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world." The image of Earth contains scattered light that resembles a beam of sunlight, which is an artifact of the camera itself that makes the tiny Earth appear even more dramatic. Voyager 1 was 40 astronomical units from the sun at this moment. One astronomical unit is 93 million miles, or 150 million kilometers. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech #nasa #space #palebluedot #history #nasahistory #voyager #carlsagan #sagan #science;
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ESA’s (European Space Agency) fifth and final Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) undocked from the International Space Station’s aft port of the Zvezda service module at 8:42 a.m. EST today. ATV-5 launched to the space station in July 2014, delivering supplies and experiments to the orbital laboratory. It will move to a safe distance from the space station for its deorbit and destructive entry in the Earth’s atmosphere Sunday. This is the last in a series of European resupply spacecraft that began servicing the space station in the spring of 2008. In all, the ATVs delivered approximately 34 tons of supplies to the complex while docked to the station of 776 days. ESA is applying its technology and knowledge from the cargo ship to develop the service module for NASA’s Orion spacecraft. This video was shared earlier today by Astronaut Barry 'Butch' Wilmore on the International Space Station. Video credit: NASA; -
If your eyes could only see the color red, this is how Saturn's rings would look. Many Cassini color images, like this one, are taken in red light so scientists can study the often subtle color variations of Saturn's rings. These variations may reveal clues about the chemical composition and physical nature of the rings. For example, the longer a surface is exposed to the harsh environment in space, the redder it becomes. Putting together many clues derived from such images, scientists are coming to a deeper understanding of the rings without ever actually visiting a single ring particle. This view looks toward the sunlit side of the rings from about 11 degrees above the ringplane. The image was taken in red light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Dec. 6, 2014. The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 870,000 miles (1.4 million kilometers) from Saturn and at a Sun-Saturn-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 27 degrees. Image scale is 5 miles (8 kilometers) per pixel. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute; -
Aboard the International Space Station (@ISS), astronaut Barry (Butch) Wilmore snapped this photo and wrote, "Spiral of lights BURSTING from Earth! #Spain looks like it is floating away from #Africa" As the second resupply ship this week prepares to leave the space station another spacecraft is being readied for its launch. Meanwhile, the six-member Expedition 42 crew was working a variety of maintenance and science tasks this week. Image Credit: NASA #space #nasa #iss #isscargo #spacestation #exp42 #sun #earth #science #astrobutch #photography #clouds #night #atmosphere #Mediterranean; -
Exploded Star Blooms Like a Cosmic Flower: Because the debris fields of exploded stars, known as supernova remnants, are very hot, energetic, and glow brightly in X-ray light, NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has proven to be a valuable tool in studying them. The supernova remnant called G299.2-2.9 (or G299 for short) is located within our Milky Way galaxy, but Chandra’s new image of it is reminiscent of a beautiful flower here on Earth. G299 was left over by a particular class of supernovas called Type Ia. Astronomers think that a Type Ia supernova is a thermonuclear explosion – involving the fusion of elements and release of vast amounts of energy − of a white dwarf star in a tight orbit with a companion star. If the white dwarf’s partner is a typical, Sun-like star, the white dwarf can become unstable and explode as it draws material from its companion. Alternatively, the white dwarf is in orbit with another white dwarf, the two may merge and can trigger an explosion. Image Credit: NASA/CXC/U.Texas #nasa #chandra #space #supernova #astronomy #science; -
And liftoff for @NOAA’s new deep space solar monitoring satellite! A new mission to monitor solar activity is now making its way to an orbit one million miles from Earth. The Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 6:03 p.m. EST Wednesday from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. DSCOVR, a partnership among the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), NASA and the U.S. Air Force, will provide NOAA space weather forecasters more reliable measurements of solar wind conditions, improving their ability to monitor potentially harmful solar activity. Image Credit: NASA #dscovr #nasa #noaa #satellite #space #science #sun #weather #spacecraft #launch #solarstorm #solarwind #nature #solarsystem #instacool;
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