View allAll Photos Tagged NASA
Makemake, second brightest dwarf planet of the Kuiper belt, has a moon. Nicknamed MK2, Makemake's moon reflects sunlight with a charcoal-dark surface, about 1,300 times fainter than its parent body. Still, it was spotted in Hubble Space Telescope observations intended to search for faint companions with the same technique used to find the small satellites of Pluto. Just as for Pluto and its satellites, further observations of Makemake and orbiting moon will measure the system's mass and density and allow a broader understanding of the distant worlds. About 160 kilometers (100 miles) across compared to Makemake's 1,400 kilometer diameter, MK2's relative size and contrast are shown in this artist's vision. An imagined scene of an unexplored frontier of the Solar System, it looks back from a spacecraft's vantage as the dim Sun shines along the Milky Way. Of course, the Sun is over 50 times farther from Makemake than it is from planet Earth. via NASA go.nasa.gov/1SFJQ7I
The Operational Land Imager (OLI) on NASA's Landsat 8 satellite acquired this large natural-color image showing a wide view of the Caspian Sea around the Tyuleniy Archipelago on April 16, 2016. Ocean scientist Norman Kuring of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center found a puzzling feature in the image -- lines crisscrossing the North Caspian Sea. via NASA ift.tt/1SnBS6G
What's more rare than a supermoon total lunar eclipse? How about a supermoon total lunar eclipse over a lightning storm. Such an electrifying sequence was captured yesterday from Ibiza, an island in southeastern Spain. After planning the location for beauty, and the timing to capture the entire eclipse sequence, the only thing that had to cooperate for this astrophotographer to capture a memorable eclipse sequence was the weather. What looked to be a bother on the horizon, though, turned out to be a blessing. The composite picture features over 200 digitally combined images from the same location over the course of a night. The full moon is seen setting as it faded to red in Earth's shadow and then returned to normal. The fortuitous lightning is seen reflected in the Mediterranean to the right of the 400-meter tall rocky island of Es Vedra. Although the next total eclipse of a large and bright supermoon will occur in 2033, the next total eclipse of any full moon will occur in January 2018 and be best visible from eastern Asia and Australia. via NASA ift.tt/1ODsDxR
Mars will look good in Earth's skies over the next few days -- but not this good. To get a view this amazing, a spacecraft had to actually visit the red planet. Running across the image center, though, is one the largest canyons in the Solar System. Named Valles Marineris, the grand valley extends over 3,000 kilometers long, spans as much as 600 kilometers across, and delves as much as 8 kilometers deep. By comparison, the Earth's Grand Canyon in Arizona, USA is 800 kilometers long, 30 kilometers across, and 1.8 kilometers deep. The origin of the Valles Marineris remains unknown, although a leading hypothesis holds that it started as a crack billions of years ago as the planet cooled. Several geologic processes have been identified in the canyon. The featured mosaic was created from over 100 images of Mars taken by Viking Orbiters in the 1970s. Tomorrow, Mars and Earth will pass the closest in 11 years, resulting in the red planet being quite noticeable toward the southeast after sunset. via NASA ift.tt/24eIt5s
The party is still going on in spiral galaxy NGC 3310. Roughly 100 million years ago, NGC 3310 likely collided with a smaller galaxy causing the large spiral galaxy to light up with a tremendous burst of star formation. The changing gravity during the collision created density waves that compressed existing clouds of gas and triggered the star-forming party. The featured image from the Gemini North Telescope shows the galaxy in great detail, color-coded so that pink highlights gas while white and blue highlight stars. Some of the star clusters in the galaxy are quite young, indicating that starburst galaxies may remain in star-burst mode for quite some time. NGC 3310 spans about 50,000 light years, lies about 50 million light years away, and is visible with a small telescope towards the constellation of Ursa Major. via NASA ift.tt/1TOrkyF
This sharp telescopic snapshot caught late September's Harvest Moon completely immersed in Earth's dark umbral shadow, at the beginning of a total lunar eclipse. It was the final eclipse in a tetrad, a string of four consecutive total lunar eclipses. A dark apparition of the Full Moon near perigee, this total eclipse's color was a deep blood red, the lunar surface reflecting light within Earth's shadow filtered through the lower atmosphere. Seen from a lunar perspective, the reddened light comes from all the sunsets and sunrises around the edges of a silhouetted Earth. But close to the shadow's edge, the limb of the eclipsed Moon shows a distinct blue hue. The blue eclipsed moonlight is still filtered through Earth's atmosphere though, originating as rays of sunlight pass through layers high in the upper stratosphere, colored by ozone that scatters red light and transmits blue. via NASA go.nasa.gov/1L6tXTb
NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite radar saw the inner core of Hurricane Irene for a fourth time on Friday afternoon, August 25. On Friday afternoon, the TRMM radar showed that the southern half of the eyewall was gone. Some strong precipitation did still exist in the remaining eyewall to the north of the eye.
The weakening of the inner-core precipitation structure that we see as Irene approaches North Carolina is similar to the pre-landfall weakening of the inner-core of Hurricane Isabel in 2003, the most recent hurricane to make landfall in North Carolina's Outer Banks.
The lack of a compact symmetric eyewall suggests that there is relatively little chance of intensification at the time of the satellite overflight. TRMM showed that the highest towering thunderstorms were about 7.5 miles high (12 kilometers).
While Hurricane Irene is forecast to pass along the East Coast all of the way to New England and then into Canada, the Friday afternoon overflight may be the last well-centered TRMM radar overflight because the orbit of the TRMM satellite stays within 35 degrees of latitude from the Equator. For satellite radar images north of 35 degrees, we will have to wait for the scheduled-2013 launch of the core satellite of the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission. The GPM core satellite will carry a dual-frequency radar as well as an enhanced passive-microwave instrument.
Just before 8 a.m. EDT, on Saturday, August 27, Hurricane Irene made landfall near Cape Lookout, North Carolina and was located near 34.7 North and 76.5 West. Irene's maximum sustained winds were near 85 mph and it was moving to the north-northeast near 14 mph. Minimum central pressure near 952 millibars. Irene's hurricane-force winds extend 90 miles from the center or 180 miles in diameter. Tropical-storm force winds extend out 260 miles from the center, making Irene about 520 miles in diameter.
Tropical-storm force winds are expected to spread northward along the mid-Atlantic coast later this morning with hurricane conditions expected this afternoon.
TRMM is a joint mission between NASA and JAXA, the Japan Space Exploration Agency. The TRMM radar data was processed in near-realtime by NASA Goddard's Precipitation Processing System. The TRMM lightning data was processed in near-realtime by NASA Marshall's Global Hydrology Resource Center.
Credit: NASA/GSFC
Owen Kelley
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
Follow us on Twitter
Join us on Facebook
Find us on Instagram
NASA's 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) with space shuttle Enterprise mounted atop over New York City & NJ metro area on Friday, April 27 2012
Participants with the NASA Social stand together, Friday, May 18, 2012, in front of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. About 50 NASA Social followers attended an event as part of activities surrounding the launch of Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, demonstration mission of the company's Falcon 9 rocket to the International Space Station. Photo Credit: (NASA/Paul E. Alers)
An image from Suomi NPP shows the Eastern United States covered with snow and lit by a blizzard. via NASA ift.tt/1PqCo4e
Pluto's pitted plains meet rugged highlands in this stunning view. On the left lies a southeastern extent of the bright region still informally known as Sputnik Planum. At right the edge of a dark region, informally Krun Macula, rises some 2.5 kilometers above the icy plains. Along the boundary, connected clusters of large pits form deep valleys, some over 40 kilometers long with shadowy floors. Nitrogen ice is likely responsible for the more reflective plains. The dark red color of the highlands is thought to be from complex compounds called tholins, a product of ultraviolet light induced chemical reactions with methane in Pluto's atmosphere. The enhanced color image includes portions of the highest and second highest resolution image data from the New Horizons July 2015 flyby of the distant world. via NASA ift.tt/1Qda7Pj
On June 24, 2016, Expedition 48 Commander Jeff Williams of NASA photographed the brilliant lights of an aurora from the International Space Station. Sharing the image on social media, Williams wrote, "We were treated to some spectacular aurora south of Australia today." via NASA ift.tt/2932HcB
NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket with the Orion spacecraft rolls to Launch Pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in preparation for launch of its Artemis I Moon mission. United Launch Alliance (ULA) under a collaborative partnership with Boeing, built the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS) upper stage of the SLS rocket that will propel Orion to the Moon. Photo by United Launch Alliance
What's more rare than a supermoon total lunar eclipse? How about a supermoon total lunar eclipse over a lightning storm. Such an electrifying sequence was captured yesterday from Ibiza, an island in southeastern Spain. After planning the location for beauty, and the timing to capture the entire eclipse sequence, the only thing that had to cooperate for this astrophotographer to capture a memorable eclipse sequence was the weather. What looked to be a bother on the horizon, though, turned out to be a blessing. The composite picture features over 200 digitally combined images from the same location over the course of a night. The full moon is seen setting as it faded to red in Earth's shadow and then returned to normal. The fortuitous lightning is seen reflected in the Mediterranean to the right of the 400-meter tall rocky island of Es Vedra. Although the next total eclipse of a large and bright supermoon will occur in 2033, the next total eclipse of any full moon will occur in January 2018 and be best visible from eastern Asia and Australia. via NASA ift.tt/1ODsDxR
This is the NASA Visualization Explorer—the coolest way to get stories about NASA's exploration of the Earth, sun, moon, planets and universe delivered right to your iPad.
Version 1.5, now available on the App Store, brings a host of new features to the app, including:
-Save stories for offline viewing
-View stories by topic
-Mark favorites
-Organize custom lists
-Pinch and zoom on images
-Design updates
...and more! Download or update NASA Viz today! svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/nasaviz/
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center enables NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s accomplishments by contributing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
Follow us on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Find us on Instagram
This sharp telescopic snapshot caught late September's Harvest Moon completely immersed in Earth's dark umbral shadow, at the beginning of a total lunar eclipse. It was the final eclipse in a tetrad, a string of four consecutive total lunar eclipses. A dark apparition of the Full Moon near perigee, this total eclipse's color was a deep blood red, the lunar surface reflecting light within Earth's shadow filtered through the lower atmosphere. Seen from a lunar perspective, the reddened light comes from all the sunsets and sunrises around the edges of a silhouetted Earth. But close to the shadow's edge, the limb of the eclipsed Moon shows a distinct blue hue. The blue eclipsed moonlight is still filtered through Earth's atmosphere though, originating as rays of sunlight pass through layers high in the upper stratosphere, colored by ozone that scatters red light and transmits blue. via NASA ift.tt/1WDpRKr
NGC 134 is probably not the best known spiral galaxy in the constellation Sculptor. Still, the tantalizing island universe is a clearly a telescopic treasure in southern skies. It shares a bright core, clumpy dust lanes, and loosely wrapped spiral arms with spiky foreground stars of the Milky Way and the more diminutive galaxy NGC 131 in this sharp cosmic vista. From a distance of about 60 million light-years, NGC 134 is seen tilted nearly edge-on. It spans some 150,000 light-years, making it even larger than our own Milky Way galaxy. NGC 134's warped disk and faint extensions give the appearance of past gravitational interactions with neighboring galaxies. Like the much closer and brighter Sculptor galaxy NGC 253, tendrils of dust appear to rise from a galactic disk sprinkled with blue star clusters and pinkish star forming regions. via NASA ift.tt/1LEhe0I
NASA image release September 17, 2010
In preparation for a cryogenic test NASA Goddard technicians install instrument mass simulators onto the James Webb Space Telescope ISIM structure. The ISIM Structure supports and holds the four Webb telescope science instruments : the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), the Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) and the Fine Guidance Sensor (FGS).
Credit: NASA/GSFC/Chris Gunn
To learn more about the James Webb Space Telescope go to: www.jwst.nasa.gov/
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center contributes to NASA’s mission through four scientific endeavors: Earth Science, Heliophysics, Solar System Exploration, and Astrophysics. Goddard plays a leading role in NASA’s endeavors by providing compelling scientific knowledge to advance the Agency’s mission.
Follow us on Twitter
Join us on Facebook
Expedition 46 crew member Tim Peake of the European Space Agency (ESA) shared a stunning image of a glowing aurora taken on Feb. 23, 2016, from the International Space Station. Peake wrote, "The @Space_Station just passed straight through a thick green fog of #aurora…eerie but very beautiful. #Principia" via NASA ift.tt/1Qyiuyk
This false-color view from NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows clouds in Saturn's northern hemisphere. The view was made using images taken by Cassini's wide-angle camera on July 20, 2016, using a combination of spectral filters sensitive to infrared light at 750, 727 and 619 nanometers. via NASA ift.tt/2b5OdPE
This image shows the galaxy Messier 94, which lies in the small northern constellation of the Hunting Dogs, about 16 million light-years away. via NASA ift.tt/203ss2Y
Where do Geminid meteors come from? In terms of location on the sky, as the featured image composite beautifully demonstrates, the sand-sized bits of rock that create the streaks of the Geminid Meteor Shower appear to flow out from the constellation of Gemini. In terms of parent body, Solar System trajectories point to the asteroid 3200 Phaethon -- but this results in a bit of a mystery since that unusual object appears mostly dormant. Perhaps, 3200 Phaethon undergoes greater dust-liberating events than we know, but even if so, exactly what happens and why remains a riddle. Peaking last week, over 50 meteors including a bright fireball were captured streaking above Xinglong Observatory in China. Since the Geminids of December are one of the most predictable and active meteor showers, investigations into details of its origin are likely to continue. via NASA ift.tt/1RGdL3e
What's more rare than a supermoon total lunar eclipse? How about a supermoon total lunar eclipse over a lightning storm. Such an electrifying sequence was captured yesterday from Ibiza, an island in southeastern Spain. After planning the location for beauty, and the timing to capture the entire eclipse sequence, the only thing that had to cooperate for this astrophotographer to capture a memorable eclipse sequence was the weather. What looked to be a bother on the horizon, though, turned out to be a blessing. The composite picture features over 200 digitally combined images from the same location over the course of a night. The full moon is seen setting as it faded to red in Earth's shadow and then returned to normal. The fortuitous lightning is seen reflected in the Mediterranean to the right of the 400-meter tall rocky island of Es Vedra. Although the next total eclipse of a large and bright supermoon will occur in 2033, the next total eclipse of any full moon will occur in January 2018 and be best visible from eastern Asia and Australia. via NASA ift.tt/1ODsDxR