View allAll Photos Tagged Interstellar
After the 2017 detecton of 1I/'Oumuamua, comet 2I/Borisov has become the second recognized interstellar interloper. Like 'Oumuamua, Borisov's measured hyperbolic trajectory and speed as it falls toward the Sun confirm that its origin is from beyond our Solar System. But while detailed observations indicate 'Oumuamua is a rocky body with differences from known Solar System objects, Borisov is definitely a far wandering comet. Taken on October 12, 2019 this Hubble Space Telescope image of Borisov reveals a familiar looking comet-like activity and concentration of dust around around its nucleus. Not resolved in the image, some estimates suggest the nucleus could be between 2 and 16 kilometers in diameter. At the time of the Hubble image, comet 2I/Borisov was about 418 million kilometers away. Borisov is still inbound though and will make its closest approach to the Sun on December 7 at a distance of about 300 million kilometers (2 Astronomical units). via NASA ift.tt/2o0KwC4
Father John Misty getting his hand kissed by an audience member at the Interstellar Rodeo in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. ©Eric Kozakiewicz/Interstellar Rodeo
They say the flap of a butterfly's wings can set off a tornado on the other side of the world. But what happens when a butterfly flaps its wings in the depths of space? This cosmic butterfly is a nebula known as AFGL 4104, or Roberts 22. Caused by a star that is nearing the end of its life and has shrugged off its outer layers, the nebula emerges as a cosmic chrysalis to produce this striking sight. Studies of the lobes of Roberts 22 have shown an amazingly complex structure, with countless intersecting loops and filaments. A butterfly's life span is counted in weeks; although on a much longer timescale, this stage of life for Roberts 22 is also transient. It is currently a preplanetary nebula, a short-lived phase that begins once a dying star has pushed much of the material in its outer layers into space, and ends once this stellar remnant becomes hot enough to ionise the surrounding gas clouds and make them glow. About 400 years ago, the star at the centre of Roberts 22 shed its outer shells, which raced outwards to form this butterfly. The central star will soon be hot enough to ionise the surrounding gas, and it will evolve into a fully fledged planetary nebula. Information about the nature, age, and structure of Roberts 22 was presented in a paper using Hubble data back in 1999, published in The Astronomical Journal.
Artscape 2008. A colaboration between Scott Pennington and Paige Shuttleworth. Photos by Nancy Froelich
This is the second interstellar comet ever discovered (the first one was Borisov; the very first interstellar object discovered - Oumuamua - wasn't a comet). It was discovered on July 1, 2025. The comet in this image is extremely faint (magnitude around 17.5), and also moving quite fast in the sky, so it was very challenging to make this photo. I photographed the comet 17 days after its discovery, from my light polluted backyard in Hamilton, Ontario. I took 90 images using 1-minute exposure through my 8-inch Ritchey–Chrétien telescope, with SvBony SV705C camera. The processing was done using the free software ASTAP.
The comet is still on it's way to the closest to the Sun point (will reach it on October 29), but it's no longer visible in the northern hemisphere.
Check for more details: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3I/ATLAS .