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The aurora at Saturn's southern pole is visible in this false-color image. Blue represents the aurora; red-orange is reflected sunlight. The image was gathered by Cassini's ultraviolet imaging spectrograph (UVIS) on June 21, 2005.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Colorado
This 2002 image of Jupiter shows concentrations of auroral X-rays near the north and south magnetic poles. While Chandra observed Jupiter for its entire 10-hour rotation, the northern auroral X-rays were discovered to be due to a single 'hot spot' that pulsates with a period of 45 minutes, similar to high-latitude radio pulsations previously detected by NASA's Galileo and Cassini spacecraft.
Although there had been prior detections of X-rays from Jupiter with other X-ray telescopes, no one expected that the sources of the X-rays would be located so near the poles. The X-rays are thought to be produced by energetic oxygen and sulfur ions that are trapped in Jupiter's magnetic field and crash into its atmosphere. Before Chandra's observations, the favored theory held that the ions were mostly coming from regions close to the orbit of Jupiter's moon, Io.
Image credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona/Lockheed Martin
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Chandra's 2002 image of the extremely hot galaxy cluster 1E 0657-56 reveals a bow-shaped shock wave toward the right side of the cluster. This feature, thought to be the result of the merger of a smaller group or sub-cluster of galaxies with 1E 0657-56, gives astronomers a rare opportunity to study how clusters grow.
The shock wave appears to have been formed as 70 million degree Celsius gas in the sub-cluster plowed through 100 million degree gas in the main cluster at a speed of about 6 million miles per hour. This motion created a wind that stripped the cooler gas from the sub-cluster, similar to leaves from a tree being blown off in a storm.
The speed, appearance and shape of the sub-cluster indicates that it would have passed through the core of the larger cluster about 150 million years ago. By the time the gravity of the cluster stops the motion of the sub-cluster, it is likely that the cooler gas will have been totally stripped.
1E 0657-56 is of great interest because it is one of the hottest known clusters. Astronomers hope to use this and future observations to determine if the high temperature of the cluster gas is due to shock waves produced by the merger of many sub-clusters.
Image credit: NASA/SAO/CXC/M.Markevitch et al.
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The 2002 Chandra observations of the peculiar galaxy Arp 220 gives insight into what happens when two galaxies the size of the Milky Way collide. The image shows a bright central region at the waist of a glowing hour-glass-shaped cloud of multimillion degree gas that is rushing out of the galaxy at hundreds of thousands of miles per hour. This "superwind" is thought to be due to explosive activity generated by the formation of hundreds of millions of new stars.
Image credit: NASA/SAO/CXC/J.McDowell
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In honor of St. Patrick's Day, we present this image of comet Tempel 1 as seen by the Chandra X-ray Observatory on June 30, 2005. The comet was bright and condensed. The Chandra data indicate that the X-rays observed from Tempel 1 are primarily due to the interaction between highly charged oxygen ions in the solar wind and neutral gases from the comet. Chandra observed the comet during the collision of NASA's Deep Impact impactor probe with Tempel 1 on July 4, and it will continue to monitor the comet in the upcoming weeks. These observations could provide information about the expansion of the ejected material away from the comet.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/C.Lisse & S.Wolk
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The galaxy cluster Abell 2029 is composed of thousands of galaxies (optical image, right) enveloped in a gigantic cloud of hot gas (X-ray image, left), and an amount of dark matter equivalent to more than a hundred trillion Suns. At the center of this cluster is an enormous, elliptically shaped galaxy that is thought to have been formed from the mergers of many smaller galaxies.
This 2003 Chandra image shows a smooth increase in the intensity of X-rays all the way into the central galaxy of the cluster. These X-rays are produced by the multimillion degree gas, which is confined to the cluster primarily by the gravity of the dark matter. By precisely measuring the temperature and intensity distribution of the X-rays, astronomers were able to make the best map yet of the distribution of dark matter in the inner region of the galaxy cluster.
The X-ray data imply that the density of dark matter increases smoothly all the way into the central galaxy of the cluster. This discovery agrees with the predictions of cold dark matter models, and is contrary to other dark matter models that predict a leveling off of the amount of dark matter in the center of the cluster.
If Abell 2029 is a representative sample of the universe, these results indicate that 70 to 90 percent of the mass of the universe consists of cold dark matter - mysterious particles left over from the dense early universe that interact with each other and "normal" matter only through gravity. Cold dark matter gets its name from the assumption that cold dark matter particles were moving slowly when galaxies and galaxy clusters began to form. The exact nature of these particles is still unknown.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/UCI/A.Lewis et al. Optical: Pal.Obs. DSS
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The 2002 Chandra image of the Tarantula Nebula gives scientists a close-up view of the drama of star formation and evolution. The Tarantula, also known as 30 Doradus, is in one of the most active star-forming regions in our Local Group of galaxies. Massive stars are producing intense radiation and searing winds of multimillion-degree gas that carve out gigantic super-bubbles in the surrounding gas. Other massive stars have raced through their evolution and exploded catastrophically as supernovas, leaving behind pulsars and expanding remnants that trigger the collapse of giant clouds of dust and gas to form new generations of stars.
30 Doradus is located about 160,000 light years from Earth in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way Galaxy. It allows astronomers to study the details of starbursts - episodes of extremely prolific star formation that play an important role in the evolution of galaxies.
At least 11 extremely massive stars with ages of about 2 million years are detected in the bright star cluster in the center of the primary image (left panel). This crowded region contains many more stars whose X-ray emission is unresolved. The brightest source in this region known as Melnick 34, a 130 solar-mass star located slightly to the lower left of center. On the lower right of this panel is the supernova remnant N157B, with its central pulsar.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/Penn State/L.Townsley et al.
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The spinning, solar-powered spacecraft will take another look of the fiery Jovian moon on July 30.
When NASA’s Juno mission flies by Jupiter’s fiery moon Io on Sunday, July 30, the spacecraft will be making its closest approach yet, coming within 13,700 miles (22,000 kilometers) of it. Data collected by the Italian-built JIRAM (Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper) and other science instruments is expected to provide a wealth of information on the hundreds of erupting volcanoes pouring out molten lava and sulfurous gases all over the volcano-festooned moon.
NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew past Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io and the gas giant itself on May 16, as shown in this rendering that relies on images from the spacecraft’s JunoCam.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS
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The 2002 Chandra image of the twin quasars Q2345+007 A, B shows that they are not identical twins. This means that it is unlikely that they are an optical illusion, rather, they were probably created by merging galaxies.
When galaxies collide, the flow of gas onto the central supermassive black holes of each of the galaxies can be enhanced, resulting in two quasars. The light from the quasar pair started its journey toward Earth 11 billion years ago. Galaxies were about three times closer together then than they are now, so collisions were much more likely.
Quasar pairs that are seen close to one another on the sky and are at the same distance from Earth often turn out to be an illusion as part of a gravitationally lensed system. In these cases, the image of a single quasar has been split into two or more images as its light has been bent and focused on its way to Earth by the gravity of an intervening massive object like a galaxy, or a cluster of galaxies.
Image credit: NASA/SAO/CXC/P.Green et al.
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Chandra's 2003 X-ray image (blue) has been combined with Hubble's optical image (red and green) to compose this stunning and revealing picture of the spiral galaxy NGC 3079. Towering filaments consisting of warm (about ten thousand degrees Celsius) and hot (about ten million degrees Celsius) gas blend to create the bright horseshoe-shaped feature near the center.
The correlation of the warm and hot filaments suggests that they were both formed as a superwind of gas -- rushing out from the central regions of the galaxy -- carved a cavity in the cool gas of disk galactic disk. The superwind stripped fragments of gas off the walls of the cavity, stretched them into long filaments, and heated them. The full extent of the superwind shows up as a fainter conical cloud of X-ray emission surrounding the filaments.
A superwind, such as the one in NGC 3079 originates in the center of the galaxy, either from activity generated by a central supermassive black hole, or by a burst of supernova activity. Superwinds are thought to play a key role in the evolution of galaxies by regulating the formation of new stars, and by dispersing heavy elements to the outer parts of the galaxy and beyond. These latest Chandra data indicate that astronomers may be seriously underestimating the mass lost in superwinds and therefore their influence within and around the host galaxy.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/STScI/U.North Carolina/G.Cecil
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Despite COVID-19-related hurdles, NASA's newest X-ray astronomy mission is a step closer to launch. Engineers recently completed integration of the agency's Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer, or IXPE, at Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado. Now, Ball will put the fully assembled observatory through a series of tests that simulate the harsh conditions the small spacecraft will encounter on its rocket trip into space in late 2021.
"Reaching this milestone is a testament to the experience, commitment, and expertise of the IXPE team and our partners around the world," said IXPE principal investigator Martin Weisskopf of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, who first conceived of the mission 30 years ago. "We're all looking forward to providing world-class science and expanding our view of the X-ray universe."
IXPE is the first small satellite mission dedicated to measuring the polarization of X-rays from a variety of cosmic sources — from black holes to exploded stars and jets traveling near the speed of light. IXPE's polarization measurements will complement observations from other telescopes in space now, including NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, adding new details about the nature of these mysterious objects and the environments close to them.
Upon completion, the IXPE observatory will be shipped to NASA's Kennedy Space Center near Cape Canaveral, Florida, for launch from launch complex 39A on a SpaceX Falcon 9 vehicle.
Image credit: Ball Aerospace
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Since astronomers captured the bright explosion of a star on February 24, 1987, researchers have been searching for the squashed stellar core that should have been left behind. A group of astronomers using data from NASA space missions and ground-based telescopes may have finally found it.
As the first supernova visible with the naked eye in about 400 years, Supernova 1987A (or SN 1987A for short) sparked great excitement among scientists and soon became one of the most studied objects in the sky. The supernova is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small companion galaxy to our own Milky Way, only about 170,000 light-years from Earth.
While astronomers watched debris explode outward from the site of the detonation, they also looked for what should have remained of the star’s core: a neutron star.
Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and previously unpublished data from NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR), in combination with data from the ground-based Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) reported last year, now present an intriguing collection of evidence for the presence of the neutron star at the center of SN 1987A.
Image credit: Chandra (X-ray): NASA/CXC/Univ. di Palermo/E. Greco; Illustration: INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo/Salvatore Orlando
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These three quasars, discovered at optical wavelengths by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, are 13 billion light years from Earth, making them the most distant known quasars. The X-rays Chandra detected in 2002 were emitted when the universe was only a billion years old, about 7 percent of the present age of the universe.
A surprising result was that the power output and other properties of these quasars are similar to less distant quasars. This indicates that the conditions around these quasars' central supermassive black holes must also be similar, contrary to some theoretical expectations. As astronomer Smita Mathur of Ohio State, who was involved in the research said, "Perhaps the most remarkable thing about them is that they are so absolutely unremarkable."
By various estimates, the supermassive black holes in these quasars weighed in at somewhere between one and 10 billion times the mass of the Sun. The implication is that the black holes put on a lot of weight soon after the galaxies formed.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/PSU/N.Brandt et al.
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U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón wrote an original poem dedicated to NASA’s Europa Clipper mission to Jupiter's moon Europa, which is believed to harbor a vast ocean beneath its icy surface.
Narrated by Limón herself, the poem is entitled “In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa” and it connects two water worlds — Earth, yearning to reach out and understand what makes a world habitable, and Europa, waiting with secrets yet to be explored. The poem will be engraved on a plaque carried aboard the Europa Clipper spacecraft.
The commissioned work was released on June 1, 2023, for NASA’s "Message in a Bottle" campaign, which invites people around the world to sign their names to the poem that will journey to another world. Participants’ names will travel 1.8 billion miles, or 2.89 billion kilometers, aboard the Europa Clipper spacecraft on its voyage to Jupiter and its moons.
The mission is set to launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in October 2024, and reach orbit around Jupiter by 2030. Over several years, it will conduct multiple flybys of Europa, gathering detailed measurements to determine if the moon has conditions suitable for life.
Read the poem, send your name to Europa, and create your own customizable souvenir artwork: Read more
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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Team members working with NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover created this “postcard” by commanding the rover to take images at two times of day on Nov. 18, 2025, spanning periods that occurred on both the 4,722nd and 4,723rd Martian days, or sols, of the mission.
The panoramas were captured at 4:15 p.m. on Sol 4,722 and 8:20 a.m. on Sol 4,723 (both at local Mars time), then merged together. Color was later added for an artistic interpretation of the scene with blue representing the morning panorama and yellow representing the afternoon one. The resulting “postcard” is similar to ones the rover took in June 2023 and November 2021. Adding color to these kinds of merged images helps different details stand out in the landscape.
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, S. Veilleux, J. Wang, J. Greene
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The 2002 Chandra image of Arp 270 shows two galaxies about 90 million light years from Earth in the early stage of a merger. The future evolution of these galaxies will be radically changed by the merger as their mutual gravity distorts their shape, and the collision of gas clouds in the galaxies stimulates the formation of new stars.
The hot spots (blue) located where the disks of the galaxies are colliding are thought to be due to the formation of hundreds of thousands of new stars as the two gaseous disks rotate through each other.
These bursts of star formation create many massive stars that generate intense winds of hot gas, and these stars eventually explode as supernovas. This violent activity produces the hot gas clouds that surround the galaxy disks (red).
Astronomers hope to understand more about how supermassive black holes are formed in the centers of galaxies by studying galaxies at different stages in the merging process. These studies will also provide valuable insight as to how our own Milky Way Galaxy formed and evolved.
In the image, red represents low, green intermediate, and blue high-energy (temperature) X-rays.
Image credit: NASA/U. Birmingham/A.Read
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Young stars much less massive than the Sun can unleash a torrent of X-ray radiation that can significantly shorten the lifetime of planet-forming disks surrounding these stars. This result comes from a new study of a group of nearby stars using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes.
Researchers found evidence that intense X-ray radiation produced by some of the young stars in the TW Hya association (TWA), which is about 160 light years from Earth, has destroyed disks of dust and gas surrounding them. These disks are where planets form. The stars are only about 8 million years old, compared to the 4.5-billion-year age of the Sun. Astronomers want to learn more about systems this young because they are at a crucial age for the birth and early development of planets.
Another key difference between the Sun and the stars in the study involves their mass. The TWA stars in the new study weigh between about one tenth to one half the mass of the Sun and also emit less light. Until now, it was unclear whether X-ray radiation from such small, faint stars could affect their planet-forming disks of material. These latest findings suggest that a faint star’s X-ray output may play a crucial role in determining the survival time of its disk.
These results mean that astronomers may have to revisit current ideas on the formation process and early lives of planets around these faint stars.
Using X-ray data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton observatory and ROSAT (the ROentgen SATellite), the team looked at the intensity of X-rays produced by a group of stars in the TWA, along with how common their star-forming disks are. They split the stars into two groups to make this comparison. The first group of stars had masses ranging from about one third to one half that of the Sun. The second group contained stars with masses only about one tenth that of the Sun, which included relatively large brown dwarfs, objects that do not have sufficient mass to generate self-sustaining nuclear reactions in their cores.
To read the full article, click here.
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The dwarf planet is cold now, but new research paints a picture of Ceres hosting a deep, long-lived energy source that may have maintained habitable conditions in the past.
New NASA research has found that Ceres may have had a lasting source of chemical energy: the right types of molecules needed to fuel some microbial metabolisms. Although there is no evidence that microorganisms ever existed on Ceres, the finding supports theories that this intriguing dwarf planet, which is the largest body in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, may have once had conditions suitable to support single-celled life-forms.
Science data from NASA’s Dawn mission, which ended in 2018, previously showed that the bright, reflective regions on Ceres’ surface are mostly made of salts left over from liquid that percolated up from underground. Later analysis in 2020 found that the source of this liquid was an enormous reservoir of brine, or salty water, below the surface. In other research, the Dawn mission also revealed evidence that Ceres has organic material in the form of carbon molecules — essential, though not sufficient on its own, to support microbial cells.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA
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This sequence of four images from NASA’s Juno spacecraft reveals the first views of the north polar region of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede. Juno is the first mission to directly image this part of Ganymede, which is the largest moon in the solar system, larger even than the planet Mercury. Ganymede is also the only known moon with its own magnetic field. Scientists have even found evidence for an underground ocean of liquid water beneath its icy surface.
Citizen scientist Gerald Eichstädt created this image using data from the JunoCam camera. The images were acquired on Dec. 25, 2019, between 6:10 and 7:00 p.m. PST (9:10 and 10 p.m. EST), during Juno's inbound approach of its 24th close flyby of Jupiter. The images were taken when Ganymede was at a range of 60,695 - 68,002 miles (97,680 - 109,439 kilometers) from the spacecraft as it flew by.
Image Credit: Image data: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS; Image processing by Gerald Eichstädt
During its 61st close flyby of Jupiter on May 12, 2024, NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured this color-enhanced view of the giant planet’s northern hemisphere. It provides a detailed view of chaotic clouds and cyclonic storms in an area known to scientists as a folded filamentary region. In these regions, the zonal jets that create the familiar banded patterns in Jupiter’s clouds break down, leading to turbulent patterns and cloud structures that rapidly evolve over the course of only a few days.
Citizen scientist Gary Eason made this image using raw data from the JunoCam instrument, applying digital processing techniques to enhance color and clarity.
At the time the raw image was taken, the Juno spacecraft was about 18,000 miles (29,000 kilometers) above Jupiter’s cloud tops, at a latitude of about 68 degrees north of the equator.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS; Image processing by Gary Eason © CC BY
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Astronomers have caught a black hole hurling hot material into space at close to the speed of light. This flare-up was captured in a new movie from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.
The black hole and its companion star make up a system called MAXI J1820+070, located in our Galaxy about 10,000 light years from Earth. The black hole in MAXI J1820+070 has a mass about eight times that of the Sun, identifying it as a so-called stellar-mass black hole, formed by the destruction of a massive star. (This is in contrast to supermassive black holes that contain millions or billions of times the Sun's mass.)
The companion star orbiting the black hole has about half the mass of the Sun. The black hole's strong gravity pulls material away from the companion star into an X-ray emitting disk surrounding the black hole.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Université de Paris/M. Espinasse et al.; Optical/IR:PanSTARRS
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This 2003 composite X-ray (blue)/optical (orange) image of M86 shows gas being swept out of the galaxy to form a long tail more than 200,000 light years in length. Located in the Virgo galaxy cluster, this enormous elliptical galaxy is moving at about 3 million miles per hour through diffuse hot gas that pervades the cluster. The supersonic motion of M86 produces pressure that is stripping gas from the galaxy and forming the spectacular tail.
M86 has been pulled into the Virgo galaxy cluster and accelerated to a high speed by the enormous combined gravity of dark matter, hot gas, and hundreds of galaxies that comprise the cluster. The infall of the galaxy into the cluster is an example of the process by which galaxy groups and galaxy clusters form over the course of billions of years.
The galaxy is no longer an "island universe" with an independent existence. It has been captured and its gas is being swept away to mix with the gas of the cluster, leaving an essentially gas-free galaxy orbiting the center of the cluster along with hundreds of other galaxies.
M86 is an unusual galaxy in that it is one of a small number of galaxies that are moving toward Earth, rather than receding with the general expansion of the Universe. This expansion is carrying the Virgo cluster away from us at a speed of about 2 million miles per hour, but M86 is falling into the Virgo cluster from the far side of the cluster, giving it a net velocity of about one million miles per hour toward Earth.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/C. Jones, W. Forman, & S. Murray. Optical: Pal.Obs. DSS
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Charon-lit-Pluto: The image shows the dark side of Pluto surrounded by a bright ring of sunlight scattered by haze in its atmosphere. But for a dark crescent zone to the left, the terrain is faintly illuminated by sunlight reflected by Pluto’s moon Charon. Researchers on the New Horizons team were able to generate this image using 360 images that New Horizons captured as it looked back on Pluto’s southern hemisphere. A large portion of the southern hemisphere was in seasonal darkness similar to winters in the Arctic and Antarctica on Earth, and was otherwise not visible to New Horizons during its 2015 flyby encounter of Pluto.
Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Southwest Research Institute/NOIRLab
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As NASA's Cassini dove close to Saturn in its final year, the spacecraft provided intricate detail on the workings of Saturn's complex rings, new analysis shows.
Although the mission ended in 2017, science continues to flow from the data collected. A new paper published June 13 in Science describes results from four Cassini instruments taking their closest-ever observations of the main rings.
Findings include fine details of features sculpted by masses embedded within the rings. Textures and patterns, from clumpy to strawlike, pop out of the images, raising questions about the interactions that shaped them. New maps reveal how colors, chemistry and temperature change across the rings.
Here, a false-color image mosaic shows Daphnis, one of Saturn's ring-embedded moons, and the waves it kicks up in the Keeler gap. Images collected by Cassini's close orbits in 2017 are offering new insight into the complex workings of the rings.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Citizen scientists have provided unique perspectives of the recent close flyby of Jupiter's icy moon Europa by NASA's Juno spacecraft. By processing raw images from JunoCam, the spacecraft’s public-engagement camera, members of the general public have created deep-space portraits of the Jovian moon that are not only awe-inspiring, but also worthy of further scientific scrutiny.
This view of Jovian moon Europa was created by processing an image JunoCam captured during Juno’s close flyby on Sept. 29.
Image credit: Image data: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Image processing by Björn Jónsson CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
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Tonight, we celebrate #ObserveTheMoon Night! International Observe the Moon Night is a time to come together with fellow Moon enthusiasts and curious people worldwide. Everyone on Earth is invited to learn about lunar science and exploration, take part in celestial observations, and honor cultural and personal connections to the Moon. We encourage everyone to interpret “observe” broadly!
But did you know that NASA is sending a space probe to study another moon? NASA's Europa Clipper is launching Oct. 10, 2024, on the first mission to conduct a detailed science investigation of Jupiter's moon Europa, pictured here. Scientists predict Europa has a salty ocean beneath its icy crust that could hold the building blocks necessary to sustain life.
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Read more International Observe the Moon Night
First X-rays from Uranus Discovered
Astronomers have detected X-rays from Uranus for the first time, using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. This result may help scientists learn more about this enigmatic ice giant planet in our solar system.
Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun and has two sets of rings around its equator. The planet, which has four times the diameter of Earth, rotates on its side, making it different from all other planets in the solar system. Since Voyager 2 was the only spacecraft to ever fly by Uranus, astronomers currently rely on telescopes much closer to Earth, like Chandra and the Hubble Space Telescope, to learn about this distant and cold planet that is made up almost entirely of hydrogen and helium.
In the new study, researchers used Chandra observations taken in Uranus in 2002 and then again in 2017. They saw a clear detection of X-rays from the first observation, just analyzed recently, and a possible flare of X-rays in those obtained fifteen years later. The main graphic shows a Chandra X-ray image of Uranus from 2002 (in pink) superimposed on an optical image from the Keck-I Telescope obtained in a separate study in 2004. The latter shows the planet at approximately the same orientation as it was during the 2002 Chandra observations.
What could cause Uranus to emit X-rays? The answer: mainly the Sun. Astronomers have observed that both Jupiter and Saturn scatter X-ray light given off by the Sun, similar to how Earth’s atmosphere scatters the Sun’s light. While the authors of the new Uranus study initially expected that most of the X-rays detected would also be from scattering, there are tantalizing hints that at least one other source of X-rays is present. If further observations confirm this, it could have intriguing implications for understanding Uranus.
One possibility is that the rings of Uranus are producing X-rays themselves, which is the case for Saturn’s rings. Uranus is surrounded by charged particles such as electrons and protons in its nearby space environment. If these energetic particles collide with the rings, they could cause the rings to glow in X-rays. Another possibility is that at least some of the X-rays come from auroras on Uranus, a phenomenon that has previously been observed on this planet at other wavelengths.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXO/University College London/W. Dunn et al; Optical: W.M. Keck Observatory
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NASA's Juno spacecraft just made the closest flybys of Jupiter's moon Io that any spacecraft has carried out in more than 20 years. An instrument on this spacecraft called “JunoCam” returned spectacular, high-resolution images—and raw data are now available for you to process, enhance, and investigate.
On Dec. 30, 2023, Juno came within about 930 miles (1,500 kilometers) of the surface of the solar system's most volcanic world. It made a second ultra-close flyby of Io just this week. The second pass went predominantly over the southern hemisphere of Io, while prior flybys have been over the north. There's a lot to see in these photos! There's evidence of an active plume, tall mountain peaks with well-defined shadows, and lava lakes—some with apparent islands.
It will be a challenge to sort all of this out, and the JunoCam scientists need your help. Previous JunoCam volunteers like Gerald Eichstadt have seen their processed images appear in multiple scientific publications and press releases.
You can find the new raw images, see the creations of other image processors, and submit your own work at: https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam/processing
In this image of Jupiter's moon Io, its night side illuminated by reflected sunlight from Jupiter, or "Jupitershine."
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Image processing by Emma Wälimäki © CC BY
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A series of 2003 Chandra observations of the spiral galaxy NGC 1637 provided a dramatic view of a violent, restless nature that belies its serene optical image. Over a span of 21 months, intense neutron star and black hole X-ray sources flashed on and off, giving the galaxy the appearance of a cosmic Christmas tree.
Erratic, volatile behavior is a common characteristic of neutron stars or black holes with orbiting normal companion stars. Gas ripped off the normal star falls toward the compact star where the gas is compressed and heated by gravitational fields billions of times stronger than on the surface of the Sun. This process generates powerful X-radiation that can flare up and subside in a matter of seconds.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/Penn State/S. Immler et al.
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NASA’s Psyche observed interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS over the course of eight hours on Sept. 8 and 9, when the comet was about 33 million miles (53 million kilometers) from the spacecraft. Captured by the mission’s multispectral imager, these observations help astronomers refine the trajectory of 3I/ATLAS.
Psyche’s multispectral imager instrument comprises a pair of identical cameras equipped with filters and telescopic lenses to photograph the metal-rich asteroid Psyche’s surface in different wavelengths of light. While comet 3I/ATLAS was distant from the spacecraft during these observations, the imager’s sensitivity to the comet’s reflected sunlight meant that the mission could precisely track the object. Observations by the mission have also provided more information about 3I/ATLAS’s faint coma, or cloud of gas and dust, surrounding its nucleus — the central frozen core of ice and rock.
As shown in this annotated composite image, NASA’s Psyche mission acquired these four observations of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS over the course of eight hours on Sept. 8 and 9, 2025, when the comet was about 33 million miles (53 million kilometers) from the spacecraft.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
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The Cassini-Huygens spacecraft captured this last “eyeful” of Saturn and its rings on March 27, 2004, as it continued its way to orbit insertion. This natural color image shows the color variations between atmospheric bands and features in the southern hemisphere of Saturn, subtle color differences across the planet’s middle B ring, as well as a bright blue sliver of light in the northern hemisphere – sunlight passing through the Cassini Division in Saturn’s rings and being scattered by the cloud-free upper atmosphere.
Cassini-Huygens, at 12,593 pounds one of the heaviest planetary probes ever, was launched on Oct. 15, 1997, on a Titan IVB/Centaur rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Although that was the most powerful expendable launch vehicle available, it wasn’t powerful enough to send the massive Cassini-Huygens on a direct path to Saturn. Instead, the spacecraft relied on several gravity assist maneuvers to achieve the required velocity to reach the ringed planet. This seven-year journey took it past Venus twice, the Earth once, and Jupiter once, gaining more velocity with each flyby for the final trip to Saturn.
On July 1, 2004, with the Huygens lander still attached, Cassini fired its main engine for 96 minutes and entered an elliptical orbit around Saturn, becoming the first spacecraft to do so. Thus began an incredible 13-year in-depth exploration of the planet, its rings and its satellites, with scores of remarkable discoveries.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
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The winds that carve the north pole’s troughs of Mars also reshape Mars’ sand dunes, causing sand to pile up on one side while removing sand from the other side. Over time, the process causes dunes to migrate, just as it does with dunes on Earth.
Surrounded by frost, these Martian dunes in Mars’ northern hemisphere were captured from above by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter using its HiRISE camera on Sept. 8, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
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NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory contributes to the understanding of planetary nebulas by studying the hottest and most energetic processes still at work in these beautiful objects. X-ray data from Chandra reveal winds being driven away from the white dwarf so quickly (i.e., millions of miles per hour) that they create shock waves during collisions with slower-moving material previously ejected by the star. Chandra’s exceptional vision in X-rays contributes to the understanding of this brief, yet important, stage of stars’ lives. Here is the NGC 3242 planetary nebula that has been observed both by Chandra and NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/STScI/Univ. Washington, B.Balick
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The 2002 Chandra image of the distant supernova remnant SNR G54.1+0.3 reveals a bright ring of high-energy particles with a central point-like source. This observation enabled scientists to use the giant Arecibo Radio Telescope to search for and locate the pulsar, or neutron star that powers the ring. The ring of particles and two jet-like structures appear to be due to the energetic flow of radiation and particles from the rapidly spinning neutron star rotating 7 times per second.
During the supernova event, the core of a massive star collapsed to form a neutron star that is highly magnetized and creates an enormous electric field as it rotates. The electric field accelerates particles near the neutron star and produces jets blasting away from the poles, and as a disk of matter and anti-matter flowing away from the equator at high speeds. As the equatorial flow rams into the particles and magnetic fields in the nebula, a shock wave forms. The shock wave boosts the particles to extremely high energies causing them to glow in X-rays and produce the bright ring (see inset).
The particles stream outward from the ring and the jets to supply the extended nebula, which spans approximately 6 light years.
The features observed in SNR G54.1+0.3 are very similar to other "pulsar wind nebulas" found by Chandra in the Crab Nebula, the Vela supernova remnant, and PSR B1509-58. By analyzing the similarities and differences between these objects, scientists hope to better understand the fascinating process of transforming the rotational energy of the neutron star into high-energy particles with very little frictional heat loss.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/U.Mass/F.Lu et al.
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See Jupiter’s Great Red Spot as you’ve never seen it before in this work of art.
Artist Mik Petter created this unique, digital artwork using data from the JunoCam imager on NASA’s Juno spacecraft. The art form, known as fractals, uses mathematical formulas to create art with an infinite variety of form, detail, color and light. The tumultuous atmospheric zones in and around the Great Red Spot are highlighted by the author's use of colorful fractals.
Vibrant colors of various tints and hues, combined with the almost organic-seeming shapes, make this image seem to be a colorized and crowded petri dish of microorganisms, or a close-up view of microscopic and wildly-painted seashells.
The original JunoCam image was taken on July 10, 2017, at 10:10 p.m. EDT, as the Juno spacecraft performed its seventh close flyby of Jupiter. The spacecraft captured the image from about 8,648 miles (13,917 kilometers) above the tops of the clouds of the planet at a latitude of -32.6 degrees.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Mik Petter
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NASA’s Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) mission launched at 1 a.m. EST Thursday on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A joint effort with the Italian Space Agency, the IXPE observatory is NASA’s first mission dedicated to measuring the polarization of X-rays from the most extreme and mysterious objects in the universe – supernova remnants, supermassive black holes, and dozens of other high-energy objects.
Image credit: NASA
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This 2003 Chandra image of the quasar GB1508+5714 reveals a jet of high-energy particles that extends more than 100,000 light years from the supermassive black hole powering the quasar. At a distance of 12 billion light years from Earth, this was the most distant jet ever detected.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/A.Siemiginowska et al.; Illustration: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss
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The X-ray image of the quasar PKS 1127-145, a highly luminous source of X-rays and visible light about 10 billion light years from Earth, shows an enormous X-ray jet that extends at least a million light years from the quasar. The jet is likely due to the collision of a beam of high-energy electrons with microwave photons.
The high-energy beam is thought to have been produced by explosive activity related to gas swirling around a supermassive black hole. The length of the jet and the observed bright knots of X-ray emission suggest that the explosive activity is long-lived but intermittent.
On their way to Earth, the X-rays from the quasar pass through a galaxy located 4 billion light years away. Atoms of various elements in this galaxy absorb some of the X-rays, and produce a dimming of the quasar's X-rays, or an X-ray shadow. In a similar way, when our body is X-rayed, our bones produce an X-ray shadow. By measuring the amount of absorption astronomers were able to estimate that 4 billion years ago, the gas in the absorbing galaxy contained a much lower concentration of oxygen relative to hydrogen gas than does our galaxy - about 5 times lower. These observations will give astronomers insight into how the oxygen supply of galaxies is built up over the eons.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/A.Siemiginowska(CfA)/J.Bechtold(U.Arizona)
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The agency is testing technologies in space and on the ground that could increase bandwidth to transmit more complex science data and even stream video from Mars.
Set to launch this fall, NASA’s Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) project will test how lasers could speed up data transmission far beyond the capacity of current radio frequency systems used in space. What’s known as a technology demonstration, DSOC may pave the way for broadband communications that will help support humanity’s next giant leap: when NASA sends astronauts to Mars.
The DSOC near-infrared laser transceiver (a device that can send and receive data) will “piggyback” on NASA’s Psyche mission when it launches to a metal-rich asteroid of the same name in October. During the first two years of the journey, the transceiver will communicate with two ground stations in Southern California, testing highly sensitive detectors, powerful laser transmitters, and novel methods to decode signals the transceiver sends from deep space.
NASA is focused on laser, or optical, communication because of its potential to surpass the bandwidth of radio waves, which the space agency has relied on for more than half a century. Both radio and near-infrared laser communications use electromagnetic waves to transmit data, but near-infrared light packs the data into significantly tighter waves, enabling ground stations to receive more data at once.
In this image, the Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) flight transceiver is inside a large tube-like sunshade and telescope on the Psyche spacecraft, as seen here inside a clean room at JPL. An earlier photo, inset, shows the transceiver assembly before it was integrated with the spacecraft.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
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Headed for Jupiter’s moon Europa, the spacecraft did some sightseeing, using a flyby of Mars to calibrate its infrared imaging instrument.
On its recent swing by Mars, NASA’s Europa Clipper took the opportunity to capture infrared images of the Red Planet. The data will help mission scientists calibrate the spacecraft’s thermal imaging instrument so they can be sure it’s operating correctly when Europa Clipper arrives at the Jupiter system in 2030.
The mission’s sights are set on Jupiter’s moon Europa and the global ocean hidden under its icy surface. A year after slipping into orbit around Jupiter, Europa Clipper will begin a series of 49 close flybys of the moon to investigate whether it holds conditions suitable for life.
A key element of that investigation will be thermal imaging — global scans of Europa that map temperatures to shed light on how active the surface is. Infrared imaging will reveal how much heat is being emitted from the moon; warmer areas of the ice give off more energy and indicate recent activity.
This picture of Mars is a composite of several images captured by Europa Clipper’s thermal imager on March 1. Bright regions are relatively warm, with temperatures of about 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius). Darker areas are colder. The darkest region at the top is the northern polar cap and is about minus 190 F (minus 125 C).
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
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NASA’s Dawn spacecraft took this image of Ceres’ south polar region on May 17, 2017. Launched on Sept. 27, 2007, Dawn was NASA’s first truly interplanetary spaceship. The mission featured extended stays at two extraterrestrial bodies: giant asteroid Vesta and dwarf planet Ceres, both in the debris-strewn main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
The spacecraft’s name was meant to present a simple view of the mission’s purpose: to provide information on the dawn of the solar system. The three principal scientific drivers for the mission were to capture the earliest moments in the origin of the solar system, determine the nature of the building blocks from which the terrestrial planets formed, and contrast the formation and evolution of two small planets that followed very different evolutionary paths.
Dawn completed the first order exploration of the inner solar system, addressed NASA’s goal of understanding the origin and evolution of the solar system, and complemented investigations of Mercury, Earth, and Mars. Dawn’s mission ended on Nov. 1, 2018, after two extended missions.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA
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X-rays from a rare type of supernova in the Whirpool Galaxy were recently observed, thanks to the fine resolution of NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. The team of researchers also detected a large number of point-like X-ray sources due to black holes and neutron stars in binary star systems.
Chandra's image highlights the energetic central regions of the two interacting galaxies, NGC 5194 (center) and its smaller companion (upper left) NGC 5195, that are collectively called the Whirlpool Galaxy.
The inset contains an expanded image of the central region of NGC 5194. Extending to the north and south of the bright nucleus are clouds of multimillion-degree gas, with diameters of about 1500 light years and 500 light years, respectively. The similarity of these features with ones observed at radio wavelengths suggests that the gas is heated by high-velocity jets produced near a supermassive black hole in the nucleus of the galaxy.
On the lower left of the inset image is a faint source identified with a supernova discovered in 1994 by amateur astronomers in Georgia, and subsequently determined to be an unusual Type Ic supernova. The massive stars responsible for these supernovas are thought to have lost their outer layers of hydrogen and helium gas thousands of years before the explosion, either through evaporation or transfer to a companion.
In the millennia before a doomed star explodes into a supernova, it loses mass. X-ray observations of the supernova shock wave provide a method to sensitively probe into this process. The Chandra data from SN 1994I and its surrounding area indicate that the progenitor star evaporated material into a cloud around the star that has a diameter at least 0.2 light years. Further monitoring over the years will tell just how large the cloud is, and how long the star was losing mass before it exploded.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/U.Md/A.Wilson et al.
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This is NASA InSight's second full selfie on Mars. Since taking its first selfie, the lander has removed its heat probe and seismometer from its deck, placing them on the Martian surface; a thin coating of dust now covers the spacecraft as well.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Chandra's 2003 images of two distant massive galaxies show that they are enveloped by vast clouds of high-energy particles that are evidence for past explosive activity. In both galaxies radio and X-ray jets allow this activity to be traced back to central supermassive black holes. The jets are heating gas outside the galaxies in regions hundreds of thousands of light years across.
The Chandra data will help scientists understand how nature imposes a weight limit on the growth of the most massive galaxies in the universe. These galaxies reside in regions of space that contain an unusually large concentration of galaxies, gas and dark matter.
A massive galaxy and its central black hole grow through cannibalization of nearby galaxies and through accumulation of gas from intergalactic space. Eventually however, the infall of matter into the central supermassive black hole will produce an energetic jet, which will heat the surrounding gas and stop the growth of the galaxy at a few dozen times the mass of our Galaxy.
Another implication of this research is that a massive galaxy does not grow steadily, but in fits and starts. In the beginning of a growth cycle, the galaxy and its central black hole are accumulating matter. The energy generated by the jets that accompany the growth of the supermassive black hole eventually brings the infall of matter and the growth of the galaxy to a halt. The activity around the central black hole then ceases because of the lack of a steady supply of matter, and the jets disappear. Millions of years later the hot gas around the galaxy cools and resumes falling into the galaxy, initiating a new season of growth.
Image credit: NASA/CXC/Columbia/C.Scharf et al.
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Infrared imagery from the solar-powered spacecraft heats up the discussion on the inner workings of Jupiter’s hottest moon.
New findings from NASA’s Juno probe provide a fuller picture of how widespread the lava lakes are on Jupiter’s moon Io and include first-time insights into the volcanic processes at work there. These results come courtesy of Juno’s Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM) instrument, contributed by the Italian Space Agency, which “sees” in infrared light. Researchers published a paper on Juno’s most recent volcanic discoveries on June 20 in the journal Nature Communications Earth and Environment.
The JunoCam instrument aboard NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured two volcanic plumes rising above the horizon of Jupiter’s moon Io. The image was taken Feb. 3 from a distance of about 2,400 miles (3,800 kilometers).
Credit: Image data: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS, Image processing by Andrea Luck (CC BY)
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This composite X-ray (red/white) and optical (green/blue) image reveals an elongated cloud, or cocoon, of high-energy particles flowing behind the rapidly rotating pulsar, B1957+20 (white point-like source). The pulsar, a.k.a. the "Black Widow" pulsar, is moving through the galaxy at a speed of almost a million kilometers per hour. A bow shock wave due to this motion is visible to optical telescopes, shown in this image as the greenish crescent shape. The pressure behind the bow shock creates a second shock wave that sweeps the cloud of high-energy particles back from the pulsar to form the cocoon.
The Black Widow pulsar is emitting intense high-energy radiation that appears to be destroying a companion star through evaporation. It is one of a class of extremely rapid rotating neutron stars called millisecond pulsars.
These objects are thought to be very old neutron stars that have been spun up to rapid rotation rates with millisecond periods by pulling material off their companions. The steady push of the infalling matter on the neutron star spins it up in much the same way as pushing on a merry-go-round causes it to rotate faster.
The advanced age, very rapid rotation rate, and relatively low magnetic field of millisecond pulsars put them in a separate class from young pulsars, such as the Crab Nebula. Yet the Chandra data show that this billion-year-old rejuvenated pulsar is an extremely efficient generator of matter and antimatter particles, just like its younger cousins.
The key is the rapid rotation of B1957+20. The Chandra result confirms the theory that even a relatively weakly magnetized neutron star can generate intense electromagnetic forces and accelerate particles to high energies to create a pulsar wind, if it is rotating rapidly enough.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/ASTRON/B.Stappers et al.; Optical: AAO/J.Bland-Hawthorn & H.Jones
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Gravity data collected by NASA’s Juno mission indicates Jupiter’s atmospheric winds penetrate the planet in a cylindrical manner, parallel to its spin axis. A paper on the findings was recently published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
The violent nature of Jupiter’s roiling atmosphere has long been a source of fascination for astronomers and planetary scientists, and Juno has had a ringside seat to the goings-on since it entered orbit in 2016. During each of the spacecraft’s 55 to date, a suite of science instruments has peered below Jupiter’s turbulent cloud deck to uncover how the gas giant works from the inside out.
NASA’s Juno captured this view of Jupiter during the mission’s 54th close flyby of the giant planet on Sept. 7. The image was made with raw data from the JunoCam instrument that was processed to enhance details in cloud features and colors.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Image processing by Tanya Oleksuik CC BY NC SA 3.0
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A crane lowers the 112-foot-wide (34-meter-wide) steel framework for the Deep Space Station 23 (DSS-23) reflector dish into position on Dec. 18, 2024, at the Deep Space Network’s (DSN) Goldstone Space Communications Complex near Barstow, California. Once online in 2026, DSS-23 will be the fifth of six new beam waveguide antennas to be added to the network; DSS-23 will boost the DSN’s capacity and enhance NASA’s deep space communications capabilities for decades to come.
The DSN allows missions to track, send commands to, and receive scientific data from faraway spacecraft. More than 100 NASA and non-NASA missions rely on the DSN and Near Space Network, including supporting astronauts aboard the International Space Station and future Artemis missions, supporting lunar exploration, and uncovering the solar system and beyond.
Credit: NASA
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Watch a time-lapse video of construction activities on Dec. 18.
When three galaxies collide, what happens to the huge black holes at the centers of each? A new study using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and several other telescopes reveals new information about how many black holes are furiously growing after these galactic smash ups.
Astronomers want to learn more about galactic collisions because the subsequent mergers are a key way that galaxies and the giant black holes in their cores grow over cosmic time.
“There have been many studies of what happens to supermassive black holes when two galaxies merge,” said Adi Foord of Stanford University, who led the study. “Ours is one of the first to systematically look at what happens to black holes when three galaxies come together.”
She and her colleagues identified triple galaxy merger systems by cross-matching the archives – containing data that is now publicly available – of NASA’s WISE mission and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to the Chandra archive. Using this method they found seven triple galaxy mergers located between 370 million and one billion light years from Earth.
Using specialized software Foord developed for her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, the team went through Chandra data targeting these systems to detect X-ray sources marking the location of growing supermassive black holes. As material falls toward a black hole, it gets heated to millions of degrees and produces X-rays.
Chandra, with its sharp X-ray vision, is ideal for detecting growing supermassive black holes in mergers. The associated X-ray sources are challenging to detect because they are usually close together in images and are often faint. Foord’s software was developed specifically to find such sources. Data from other telescopes was then used to rule out other possible origins of the X-ray emission unrelated to supermassive black holes.
The results from Foord and the team show that out of seven triple galaxy mergers there is one with a single growing supermassive black hole, four with double growing supermassive black holes, and one that is a triple. The final triple merger they studied seems to have struck out with no X-ray emission detected from the supermassive black holes. In the systems with multiple black holes, the separations between them range between about 10,000 and 30,000 light years.
Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ. of Michigan/A. Foord et al.; Optical: SDSS & NASA/STScI
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NASA’s Europa Clipper has embarked on its long voyage to Jupiter, where it will investigate Europa, a moon with an enormous subsurface ocean that may have conditions to support life. The spacecraft launched at 12:06 p.m. EDT Monday, Oct. 14, aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The largest spacecraft NASA ever built for a mission headed to another planet, Europa Clipper also is the first NASA mission dedicated to studying an ocean world beyond Earth. The spacecraft will travel 1.8 billion miles (2.9 billion kilometers) on a trajectory that will leverage the power of gravity assists, first to Mars in four months and then back to Earth for another gravity assist flyby in 2026. After it begins orbiting Jupiter in April 2030, the spacecraft will fly past Europa 49 times.
Credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett
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