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Minggu, 30 Desember 2012
Sentinels of the Arctic
Who guards the north? Judging from this photograph, possibly giant trees covered in snow and ice. The picture was taken in 2011 in Finnish Lapland where weather can include sub-freezing temperatures and driving snow. Surreal landscapes sometimes result, where common trees become cloaked in white and so appear, to...
Pink Aurora over Crater Lake
Why is this aurora strikingly pink? When photographing picturesque Crater Lake in Oregon, USA in June 2012, the background sky lit up with auroras of unusual colors. Although much is known about the physical mechanisms that create auroras, accurately predicting the occurrence and colors of auroras remains a topic...
Sabtu, 29 Desember 2012
Volcano and Aurora in Iceland
Sometimes both heaven and Earth erupt. In Iceland in 1991, the volcano Hekla erupted at the same time that auroras were visible overhead. Hekla, one of the most famous volcanoes in the world, has erupted at least 20 times over the past millennium, sometimes causing great destruction. The last...
Jumat, 28 Desember 2012
Kamis, 27 Desember 2012
Rabu, 26 Desember 2012
Sarychev Peak Eruption seen from the International Space Station
A fortuitous orbit of the International Space Station allowed the astronauts this striking view of Sarychev Volcano (Kuril Islands, northeast of Japan) in an early stage of eruption on June 12, 2009. Sarychev Peak is one of the most active volcanoes in the Kuril Island chain, and it is...
Selasa, 25 Desember 2012
Geminids over Kitt Peak
Two large telescope domes stand in the foreground of this night sky view from Kitt Peak National Observatory, near Tucson, Arizona, USA. The dramatic scene was recorded in 2010 near the peak of December's Geminid Meteor Shower. With dome slit open, the building closest to the camera houses the...
On the road to Carina
This rugged road through the dark Atacama Desert seems to lead skyward toward the bright stars and glowing nebulae of the southern Milky Way. If you follow the road you will get to Cerro Armazones peak in Chile, future construction site for the 40-meter class European Extremely Large Telescope....
Senin, 24 Desember 2012
Earthrise - 24 December 1968
The rising Earth is about five degrees above the lunar horizon in this telephoto view taken from the Apollo 8 spacecraft near 110 degrees east longitude. The horizon, about 570 kilometers (350 statute miles) from the spacecraft, is near the eastern limb of the moon as viewed from Earth....
Gas Pillars in the Eagle Nebula (M16): Pillars of Creation in a Star-Forming Region
Undersea corral? Enchanted castles? Space serpents? These eerie, dark pillar-like structures are actually columns of cool interstellar hydrogen gas and dust that are also incubators for new stars. The pillars protrude from the interior wall of a dark molecular cloud like stalagmites from the floor of a cavern. They...
Jumat, 21 Desember 2012
Solar Minimum and Solar Maximum
The Sun goes through a natural solar cycle approximately every 11 years. The cycle is marked by the increase and decrease of sunspots - visible as dark blemishes on the Sun's surface, or photosphere. The greatest number of sunspots in any given solar cycle is designated as "solar maximum."...
Rabu, 19 Desember 2012
Dust Pillars in the Carina Nebula
These one-light-year-tall pillars of cold hydrogen and dust, imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope, are located in the Carina Nebula. Violent stellar winds and powerful radiation from massive stars are sculpting the surrounding nebula. Inside the dense structures, new stars may be born.This image of dust pillars in the...
Selasa, 18 Desember 2012
Moon, Jupiter and Moons
Skygazers around planet Earth enjoyed the close encounter of planets and Moon in July 15's predawn skies. And while many saw bright Jupiter next to the slender, waning crescent, Europeans also had the opportunity to watch the ruling gas giant pass behind the lunar disk, occulted by the Moon...
Senin, 17 Desember 2012
Minggu, 16 Desember 2012
Two Earth's Satellites viewed from Houston
This photograph taken from Houston, Texas, juxtaposes Earth’s oldest satellite with one of its youngest. The Moon is thought to have been formed by the impact of a large body (perhaps Mars-sized) with the early Earth approximately 4.6 billion years ago. In contrast, the first components of the International...
Sabtu, 15 Desember 2012
Eta Carinae: A Star on the Brink of Destruction
A huge, billowing pair of gas and dust clouds are captured in this stunning NASA Hubble Space Telescope image of the supermassive star Eta Carinae.Using a combination of image processing techniques (dithering, subsampling and deconvolution), astronomers created one of the highest resolution images of an extended object ever produced...
Jumat, 14 Desember 2012
Sunset seen from the International Space Station
This spectacular image of sunset on the Indian Ocean was taken by astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS). The image presents an edge-on, or limb view, of the Earth’s atmosphere as seen from orbit. The Earth’s curvature is visible along the horizon line, or limb, that extends across...
Cloudy Night of the Northern Lights
On September 26, 2011, a large solar Coronal Mass Ejection smacked into planet Earth's magnetosphere producing a severe geomagnetic storm and wide spread auroras. Captured here near local midnight from Kvaløya island outside Tromsø in northern Norway, the intense auroral glow was framed by parting rain clouds. Tinted orange,...
Rabu, 12 Desember 2012
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