Pic of the Week: Saturn at Night

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): View of Saturn provided by the Cassini spacecraft. (NASA, JPL-Caltech, Space Science Institute, Mindaugas Macijauskas)

This week’s image of Saturn comes from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which orbited the planet for 13 years. Even after seeing so many images of Saturn, the spacecraft continued to surprise us with new and unique views.

Here is a little more about the image from NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day:

Telescopic views of Saturn and its beautiful rings often make it the star of star parties. But this stunning view of the outer gas gaint planet’s rings and night side just isn’t possible from telescopes in the vicinity of planet Earth. Peering out from the inner Solar System they can only bring Saturn’s day side into view. In fact, this image of Saturn’s slender sunlit crescent with the planet’s night shadow cast across its broad and complex ring system was captured by the robot spacecraft Cassini. After a seven year long journey from planet Earth, Cassini called Saturn orbit home for 13 years (from 2004 – 2017) before it was directed to dive into the atmosphere of the gas giant on September 15, 2017. This magnificent mosaic is composed of frames recorded by Cassini’s wide-angle camera only two days before its grand final plunge. And Saturn’s night will not be seen again until another spaceship from Earth calls.

Pic of the Week: The Crystal Ball Nebula

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): An image of NGC 1514, also called the Crystal Ball Nebula, as captured by the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii. (International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA)

This week’s image is from the Gemini North telescope located on the summit of Maunakea in Hawaii. NGC 1514, or the Crystal Ball Nebula, is about 1,500 light-years away. It was first discovered in 1790 by German–British astronomer William Herschel, who classified it as a planetary nebula.

Here is a little more about the nebula from NOIRLab:

Planetary nebulae form when a low- or intermediate-mass star ejects its outer layers near the end of its life, forming a somewhat spherical cloud of gas. They typically have smoother, spherical shapes, making the Crystal Ball Nebula unique for its bumpy shells of gas. As the central star casts away this gas, its inner core is exposed. Radiation from the core energizes the gas, giving it a scorching temperature and chromatic glow…While it may appear in this image as if there is a single shining light source at the heart of the Crystal Ball Nebula, as Herschel saw, it actually contains two stars. These two stars orbit each other with a period of around nine years — the longest known for any binary pair within a planetary nebula. Scientists believe that one of these stars, which was once several times more massive than our Sun, released its outer layers while in the throes of death. As the progenitor star and its binary companion orbit each other, they mold the expanding shell of gas with their strong, asymmetrical winds, forming the lumpy layers we see today.

Pic of the Week: Crescent Mars

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Image (Credit): Mars as captured on May 15, 2026 by NASA’s Psyche mission as it approached the planet for a gravity assist. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU)

This week’s image comes from the Psyche spacecraft that is utilizing Martian gravity for its flight plan on its way to the asteroid Psyche in the asteroid belt. This image of a crescent Mars is one of many drive-by photos for both science and our enjoyment.

Here is more on this Martian part of the mission from NASA:

Because Psyche approached Mars from a high phase angle, the planet appeared as a thin crescent in the days running up to the close approach, lit by sunlight reflecting off its surface. In observations from the spacecraft’s multispectral imager, the crescent appeared brighter and extended farther around the planet’s disk than anticipated because of the strong scattering of sunlight through the planet’s dusty atmosphere. As Psyche passed from Mars’ nighttime skies to daytime, it took a rapid series of pictures of the surface around the time of closest approach.

“We’ve captured thousands of images of the approach to Mars and of the planet’s surface and atmosphere at close approach. This dataset provides unique and important opportunities for us to calibrate and characterize the performance of the cameras, as well as test the early versions of our image processing tools being developed for use at the asteroid Psyche,” said Jim Bell, the Psyche imager instrument lead at Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe. “As the spacecraft continues its journey after the flyby, we’ll continue calibration imaging of Mars for the rest of the month as it recedes into the distance.”

Pic of the Week: Spiral Arm of Galaxy M51

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Image (Credit): View of an arm of the Messier 51 galaxy from both JWST and the Hubble Space Telescop. (ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Pedrini, A. Adamo (Stockholm University) and the FEAST JWST team)

This week’s image is from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Hubble Space Telescope, which together scanned about 9,000 star clusters in the four galaxies. What you are looking at above comes from the spiral arm of one of the galaxies – Messier 51 (M51).

Here is a description from the European Space Agency (ESA) regarding what you are seeing in the image:

A large, long portion of one of the spiral arms in galaxy M51. Red-orange, clumpy filaments of gas and dust that stretch in a chain from left to right comprise the arm. Shining cyan bubbles light up parts of the gas clouds from within, and gaps expose bright star clusters in these bubbles as glowing white dots. The whole image is dotted with small stars. A faint blue glow around the arm colours the otherwise dark background.

Pic of the Week: Spiral Galaxy NGC 3137

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Hubble Space Telescope image of NGC 3137, located 53 million light-years away. (ESA/Hubble & NASA, D. Thilker and the PHANGS-HST Team

This week’s image is from the Hubble Space Telescope. It shows spiral galaxy NGC 3137 in all its glory. We are getting a nice inclined view of the galaxy, allowing us to see multiple arms of stars.

The European Space Agency (ESA) describes what we are seeing in this way:

A spiral galaxy seen close up and tilted at an angle, so that its disc fills the view from corner to corner. Its disc is yellow near to the centre and pale blue farther out, showing cooler and hotter stars, respectively. Thin brown clouds of dust, glowing pink spots of star formation, and sparkling blue patches filled with star clusters swirl through the galaxy. Behind it, small orange dots are very distant galaxies.