Enhanced version of the Nasa astronomy picture of the day website
A Waterspout in Florida
What's happening over the water? Pictured here is one of the better images yet recorded of a waterspout, a type of tornado that occurs over water. Waterspouts are spinning columns of rising...
NGC 1333: Stellar Nursery in Perseus
In visible light NGC 1333 is seen as a reflection nebula, dominated by bluish hues characteristic of starlight reflected by interstellar dust. A mere 1,000 light-years distant toward the heroic...
Solar Eclipse from Western Australia
Along a narrow path that mostly avoided landfall, the shadow of the New Moon raced across planet Earth's southern hemisphere on April 20 to create a rare annular-total or hybrid solar eclipse. A...
The Dark Seahorse in Cepheus
Spanning light-years, this suggestive shape known as the Seahorse Nebula appears in silhouette against a rich, luminous background of stars. Seen toward the royal northern constellation of Cepheus,...
Auroral Storm over Lapland
On some nights the sky is the best show in town. On this night, auroras ruled the sky, and the geomagnetic storm that created this colorful sky show originated from an increasingly active Sun....
Map of Total Solar Eclipse Path in 2024 April
Would you like to see a total eclipse of the Sun? If so, do any friends or relatives live near the path of next April's eclipse? If yes again, then you might want to arrange a well-timed visit....
ELVES Lightning over Italy
What's that red ring in the sky? Lightning. The most commonly seen type of lightning involves flashes of bright white light between clouds. Over the past 50 years, though, other types of...
M2-9: Wings of a Butterfly Nebula
Are stars better appreciated for their art after they die? Actually, stars usually create their most artistic displays as they die. In the case of low-mass stars like our Sun and M2-9 pictured...
When Z is for Mars
A composite of images captured about a week apart from mid August 2022 through late March 2023, this series traces the retrograde motion of ruddy-colored Mars. Progressing from lower right to upper...
Portrait of NGC 3628
Sharp telescopic views of NGC 3628 show a puffy galactic disk divided by dark dust lanes. Of course, this portrait of the magnificent, edge-on spiral galaxy puts some astronomers in mind of its...
NGC 2419: Intergalactic Wanderer
Stars of the globular cluster NGC 2419 are packed into this Hubble Space Telescope field of view toward the mostly stealthy constellation Lynx. The two brighter spiky stars near the edge of the...
NGC 206 and the Star Clouds of Andromeda
The large stellar association cataloged as NGC 206 is nestled within the dusty arms of the neighboring Andromeda galaxy along with the galaxy's pinkish star-forming regions. Also known as M31,...
North Star: Polaris and Surrounding Dust
Why is Polaris called the North Star? First, Polaris is the nearest bright star toward the north spin axis of the Earth. Therefore, as the Earth turns, stars appear to revolve around Polaris, but...
IC 2944: The Running Chicken Nebula
To some, it looks like a giant chicken running across the sky. To others, it looks like a gaseous nebula where star formation takes place. Cataloged as IC 2944, the Running Chicken Nebula spans...
The Egg Nebula in Polarized Light
Where is the center of the Egg Nebula? Emerging from a cosmic egg, the star in the center of the Egg Nebula is casting away shells of gas and dust as it slowly transforms itself into a white dwarf...
M100: A Grand Design Spiral Galaxy
Majestic on a truly cosmic scale, M100 is appropriately known as a grand design spiral galaxy. It is a large galaxy of over 100 billion stars with well-defined spiral arms that is similar to our...
Rigel Wide
Brilliant, blue, supergiant star Rigel marks the foot of Orion the Hunter in planet Earth's night. Designated Beta Orionis, it's at the center of this remarkably deep and wide field of view. ...
Terran 1 Burns Methalox
Relativity's Terran 1 Rocket is mostly 3D-printed. It burns a cryogenic rocket fuel composed of liquid methane and liquid oxygen (methalox). In this close-up of a Terran 1 launch on the night of...
Rubin's Galaxy
In this Hubble Space Telescope image the bright, spiky stars lie in the foreground toward the heroic northern constellation Perseus and well within our own Milky Way galaxy. In sharp focus beyond...
Olympus Mons: Largest Volcano in the Solar System
The largest volcano in our Solar System is on Mars. Although three times higher than Earth's Mount Everest, Olympus Mons will not be difficult for humans to climb because of the volcano's...