Since measurements began in 1895, Alaska’s Hubbard Glacier has been thickening and steadily advancing into Disenchantment Bay. The advance runs counter to so many thinning and retreating glaciers nearby in Alaska and around the world. This image, acquired by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8, shows Hubbard Glacier on July 22, 2014. According to Leigh Stearns, a glaciologist at the University of Kansas, Hubbard’s advance is due to its large accumulation area; the glacier’s catchment basin extends far into the Saint Elias Mountains. Snow that falls in the basin either melts or flows down to the terminus, causing Hubbard to steadily grow. In addition, Hubbard is building up a large moraine, shoveling sediment, rock, and other debris from Earth’s surface onto the glacier’s leading edge. The moraine at the front gives the glacier stability and allows it to advance more easily because the ice does not need to be as thick to stay grounded. (If it is thin, it can start floating and will not necessarily advance.) Image Credit: NASA/Earth Observatory #earth #nasa #earthrightnow #climate #hubbard #glacier #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 22,381

Astronaut Scott Kelly shared this aquamarine seascape view of Earth from the International Space Station on May 10, 2015. He noted that it looked like a "watercolor from space." Astronauts have used hand-held cameras to photograph the Earth for more than 40 years. Beginning with the Mercury missions in the early 1960s, astronauts have taken more than 1.5 million photographs of the Earth. Today, the International Space Station (@ISS) continues the NASA tradition of Earth observation from human-tended spacecraft. Operational since November 2000, the space station is well suited for documenting Earth features. The ISS maintains an altitude between 220 - 286 miles (354 - 460 km) above the Earth, and an orbital inclination of 51.6˚, providing an excellent stage for observing most populated areas of the world. Image credit: NASA #nasa #iss #earthobs #spacestation #internationalspacestation #earth #blue #water #aquamarine #seascape #watercolor @StationCDRKelly #space Instagram ดารา @nasa 29,897

The glowing object in this Hubble Space Telescope image is an elliptical galaxy called NGC 3923. It is located over 90 million light-years away in the constellation of Hydra. NGC 3923 is an example of a shell galaxy where the stars in its halo are arranged in layers. Finding concentric shells of stars enclosing a galaxy is quite common and is observed in many elliptical galaxies. In fact, every tenth elliptical galaxy exhibits this onion-like structure, which has never been observed in spiral galaxies. The shell-like structures are thought to develop as a consequence of galactic cannibalism, when a larger galaxy ingests a smaller companion. As the two centers approach, they initially oscillate about a common center, and this oscillation ripples outwards forming the shells of stars just as ripples on a pond spread when the surface is disturbed. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA #nasa #hubble #hst #hubbe25 #space #astronomy #telescope #galaxy #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 3,964

Aboard the International Space Station, astronaut Terry Virts (@Astro_Terry) posted this image and wrote, "Flying away from one of the most incredible auroras I've seen, just west of #Australia." Image Credit: NASA #nasa #iss #space #astronauts #aurora Instagram ดารา @nasa 23,719

Using our Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have captured for the first time snapshots of fledging white dwarf stars beginning their slow-paced, 40-million-year migration from the crowded center of an ancient star cluster to the less populated suburbs. Credits: NASA, ESA, and H. Richer and J. Heyl (University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada) #nasa #hubble #esa #space #hst #hubble25 #stars #nasabeyond #astronomy #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 40,624

A new NASA study finds the last remaining section of Antarctica's Larsen B Ice Shelf, which partially collapsed in 2002, is quickly weakening and likely to disintegrate completely before the end of the decade. A team led by Ala Khazendar of our Jet Propulsion Laboratory (@NASAJPL) in Pasadena, California, found the remnant of the Larsen B Ice Shelf is flowing faster, becoming increasingly fragmented and developing large cracks. Two of its tributary glaciers also are flowing faster and thinning rapidly. "These are warning signs that the remnant is disintegrating," Khazendar said. "Although it’s fascinating scientifically to have a front-row seat to watch the ice shelf becoming unstable and breaking up, it’s bad news for our planet. This ice shelf has existed for at least 10,000 years, and soon it will be gone." Credits: NSIDC/Ted Scambos #nasa #space #earth #earthrightnow #antactica #climate #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 26,599

From a distance Saturn seems to exude an aura of serenity and peace. In spite of this appearance, Saturn is an active and dynamic world. Its atmosphere is a fast-moving and turbulent place with wind speeds in excess of 1,100 miles per hour (1,800 km per hour) in places. The lack of a solid surface to create drag means that there are fewer features to slow down the wind than on a planet like Earth. Mimas, to the upper-right of Saturn, has been brightened by a factor of 2 for visibility. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute #nasa #cassini @NASAJPL #saturn #planets #astronomy #science #nasabeyond Instagram ดารา @nasa 14,789

Sunrise over the Grand Canyon! From the International Space Station (@ISS), astronaut Terry Virts (@AstroTerry) took this photograph of an early morning sunrise over the Grand Canyon and posted it to social media on May 10, 2015. The space station and its crew orbit Earth from an altitude of 220 miles, traveling at a speed of approximately 17,500 miles per hour. Because the station completes each trip around the globe in about 92 minutes, the crew experiences 16 sunrises and sunsets each day. Image Credit: NASA #iss #space #spacestation #nasa #astronauts #earth Instagram ดารา @nasa 34,582

Martian Sunset! The sun dips to a Martian horizon in a blue-tinged sky in images sent home to Earth this week from our Curiosity Mars rover. Curiosity used its Mast Camera (Mastcam) to record the sunset during an evening of skywatching on April 15, 2015. The imaging was done between dust storms, but some dust remained suspended high in the atmosphere. The sunset observations help researchers assess the vertical distribution of dust in the atmosphere. "The colors come from the fact that the very fine dust is the right size so that blue light penetrates the atmosphere slightly more efficiently," said Mark Lemmon of Texas A&M University, College Station, the Curiosity science-team member who planned the observations. "When the blue light scatters off the dust, it stays closer to the direction of the sun than light of other colors does. The rest of the sky is yellow to orange, as yellow and red light scatter all over the sky instead of being absorbed or staying close to the sun." Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS #nasa #mars #sunset #curiosityrover #curiosity #science @nasajpl Instagram ดารา @nasa 39,361

Happy Mother's Day! Send your mom this interstellar 'rose, seen here by our Spitzer Space Telescope. These bright young stars are found in a rosebud-shaped (and rose-colored) nebulosity known as NGC 7129. The star cluster and its associated nebula are located at a distance of 3300 light-years in the constellation Cepheus. The stars formed from a massive cloud of gas and dust that contains enough raw materials to create a thousand Sun-like stars. In a process that astronomers still poorly understand, fragments of this molecular cloud became so cold and dense that they collapsed into stars. Most stars in our Milky Way galaxy are thought to form in such clusters. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech/Harvard-Smithsonian CfA #mothersday #moms #mom #flowers #mom #nasa #spitzer #space #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 28,925

This image provides the clearest ever view of galaxy NGC 949, which lies over 30 million light-years away in the constellation of Triangulum. The galaxy has an unusual shape, made more obscure due to its inclination. From our point of view, it is difficult to discern exactly what type of galaxy NGC 949 is, but it is certainly a disk galaxy of some kind, most likely a spiral. Taken with Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), this image shows extraordinary detail. This detail allows us to see a strange asymmetric alignment in the dark lanes of dust that snake across the galaxy. The top-right half of the galaxy appears considerably more marbled with dust in this image; a curious observation explained by stars tending to favor locations towards the center of a galaxy, and dust preferring almost invariably to reside along the galactic plane. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA #hubble #hst #galaxy #nasa #space Instagram ดารา @nasa 23,760

Decades of satellite observations and astronaut photographs show that clouds dominate space-based views of Earth. One study based on nearly a decade of satellite data estimated that about 67 percent of Earth’s surface is typically covered by clouds. This is especially the case over the oceans, where other research shows less than 10 percent of the sky is completely clear of clouds at any one time. Over land, 30 percent of skies are completely cloud free. Earth’s cloudy nature is unmistakable in this global cloud fraction map, based on data collected by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on our Aqua satellite. While MODIS collects enough data to make a new global map of cloudiness every day, this version of the map shows an average of all of the satellite’s cloud observations between July 2002 and April 2015. Colors range from dark blue (no clouds) to light blue (some clouds) to white (frequent clouds). Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory image by Jesse Allen and Kevin Ward, using data provided by the MODIS Atmosphere Science Team, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center #nasa #space #earth #earthrightnow #clouds #oceans #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 22,143

We found evidence that a massive star exploded in a lopsided fashion, sending ejected material flying in one direction and the core of the star in the other. The findings offer the best proof yet that star explosions of this type, called Type II or core-collapse supernovae, are inherently asymmetrical, a phenomenon that had been difficult to prove before now. The still unraveling remains of supernova 1987A are shown here in this image taken by our Hubble Space Telescope. The bright ring consists of material ejected from the dying star before it detonated. The ring is being lit up by the explosion's shock wave. Credits: ESA/Hubble & NASA @nasa #nasabeyond #nustar #supernova #star #hubble #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 25,244

Just how big was yesterday’s solar flare? Well, compare it to the size of Earth. The X2.7 class solar flare flashed on the edge of the sun on May 5, 2015. This image was captured by our Solar Dynamics Observatory and shows a blend of light from different wavelengths. The Earth is shown to scale. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however -- when intense enough -- they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel. Credit: NASA/GSFC/SDO #nasa #nasabeyond #space #sun #sdo #solarflare #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 32,948

We captured these images of a significant solar flare using our Solar Dynamics Observatory – as seen in the bright flash on the left – peaking at 6:11 p.m. EDT on May 5, 2015. Each image shows a different wavelength of extreme ultraviolet light that highlights a different temperature of material on the sun. By comparing different images, scientists can better understand the movement of solar matter and energy during a flare. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however -- when intense enough -- they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel. Image Credit: NASA/SDO/Wiessinger #nasa #sun #solarflare #sdo #nasabeyond #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 3,181

Astronomers set a new galaxy distance record! This is a Hubble Space Telescope image of the farthest spectroscopically confirmed galaxy observed to date (inset). It was identified in this Hubble image of a field of galaxies in the CANDELS survey (Cosmic Assembly Near-infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey). NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope also observed the unique galaxy. The W. M. Keck Observatory was used to obtain a spectroscopic redshift (z=7.7), extending the previous redshift record. Measurements of the stretching of light, or redshift, give the most reliable distances to other galaxies. This source is thus currently the most distant confirmed galaxy known, and it appears to also be one of the brightest and most massive sources at that time. The galaxy existed over 13 billion years ago. The near-infrared light image of the galaxy (inset) has been colored blue as suggestive of its young, and hence very blue, stars. The CANDELS field is a combination of visible-light and near-infrared exposures. Credits: NASA, ESA, P. Oesch (#Yale U.) #hst #nasa #hubble #esa #galaxy #astronomy #spitzer #keck #space #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 31,395

Flying by the "Death Star" Moon! In this view captured by our Cassini spacecraft on its closest-ever flyby of Saturn's moon Mimas, large Herschel Crater dominates Mimas, making the moon look like the Death Star in the movie "Star Wars." May the 4th Be With You! Image Credit: NASA ‪#‎nasa‬ ‪#‎space‬ ‪#‎saturn‬ ‪#‎maythe4thbewithyou‬ ‪#‎happystarwarsday‬ ‪#‎moon‬ Instagram ดารา @nasa 14,418

Tatooine? No, it's Kepler-16b, illustrated in this artist concept. The existence of a world with a double sunset, as portrayed in the film Star Wars more than 30 years ago, is now scientific fact. Our Kepler mission has made the first unambiguous detection of a circumbinary planet - a planet orbiting two stars - 200 light-years from Earth. Unlike Star Wars' Tatooine, the planet is cold, gaseous and not thought to harbor life, but its discovery demonstrates the diversity of planets in our galaxy. Previous research has hinted at the existence of circumbinary planets, but clear confirmation proved elusive. Kepler detected such a planet by observing transits, where the brightness of a parent star dims from the planet crossing in front of it. Image Credit: NASA #nasa #kepler #space #astronomy#maythe4thbewithyou #happystarwarsday #science Instagram ดารา @nasa 33,683

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away... The unusual spiral galaxy, Messier 66, is located at a distance of about 35 million light-years in the constellation of Leo. Together with Messier 65 and NGC 3628, Messier 66 is the member of the Leo Triplet, a trio of interacting spiral galaxies, part of the larger Messier 66 group. Messier 66 wins in size over its fellow triplets - it is about 100 000 light-years across. Credit: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration. Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin and Robert Gendler ‪#‎nasa‬ ‪#‎hubble‬ ‪#‎space‬ ‪#‎astronomy‬ ‪#‎maythe4thbewithyou‬‪#‎happystarwarsday‬ ‪#‎science‬ ‪#‎hst‬ ‪#‎galaxy‬ Instagram ดารา @nasa 33,182

Aboard the International Space Station, European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti posted this image at the end of the day Friday and wrote, "Good night from #space. Buona notte dallo spazio." Last week the station astronauts continued preparing for the next round of robotic refueling demonstrations while conducting various biomedical experiments and checkouts. Image Credit: NASA/ESA #iss #nasa #esa #spacestation #earth Instagram ดารา @nasa 42,203