Browse NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day archive by date and media: Archive Discoveries
Browse the NASA APOD archive without needing the exact date first. Filter by media type and keep moving deeper into older images and videos.
Crater Wall on Solis Planum
This dramatic perspective view looks south-east along the wall of a large eroded impact crater on S olis Planum, bordering the mountainous Thaumasia region of Mars. Stretching for…
HUDF: Dawn of the Galaxies
When did galaxies form? Faint red smudges identified on the deepest optical sky image ever taken may well be members of the first class of galaxies. Detailed inspection of the…
Aurora Over a Communications Tower
Higher than highest communications tower , higher than highest mountain , higher than highest airplane , lies the realm of the aurora. Auroras rarely reach below 60 kilometers,…
The Great Nebula in Orion
The Great Nebula in Orion is a colorful place. Visible to the unaided eye, it appears as a small fuzzy patch in the constellation of Orion . Long exposure, digitally sharpened…
Looking Back at an Eclipsed Earth
Here is what the Earth looks like during a solar eclipse . The shadow of the Moon can be seen darkening part of Earth . This shadow moved across the Earth at nearly 2000…
The Iron Sun
The ultraviolet light emitted by eleven times ionized iron at temperatures over 2 million degrees Farenheit was used to record the above picture of the Sun on September 22, 2001,…
Fornax Cluster in Motion
Reminiscent of popular images of the lovely Pleiades star cluster that lies within our own Milky Way Galaxy, this false-color x-ray view actually explores the center of a much…
La Silla's Starry Night
On clear, moonless nights, the stars still come out with a vengance above the high-altitude La Silla astronomical observatory. Taking advantage of a recent visit to this first…
Spirit Rover at Engineering Flats on Mars
Is it art? Here the paintbrush was the Spirit robotic rover , the canvas was the soil on Mars , and the artists were the scientists and engineers of the Mars Exploration Rover…
M24: A Sagittarius Starscape
Many vast star fields in the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy are rich in clouds of dust, and gas. First and foremost, visible in the above picture are millions of stars, many of…
Seeing Through Saturn's C-Ring
Are Saturn's rings transparent? The Cassini spacecraft that recently entered orbit around Saturn has confirmed that some of Saturn's rings are more transparent than others.…
Earth's North Magnetic Pole
A magnetic compass does not point toward the true North Pole of the Earth. Rather, it more closely points toward the North Magnetic Pole of the Earth. The North Magnetic Pole is…
M55: Globular Star Cluster
The fifty-fifth entry in Charles Messier's catalog, M55 is a large and lovely globular cluster of around 100,000 stars. Only 20,000 light-years away in the constellation…
IC 1805: Light from the Heart
Sprawling across hundreds of light-years, emission nebula IC 1805 is a mix of glowing interstellar gas and dark dust clouds. Only about 7,500 light-years away, stars were born in…
Microquasar in Motion
Microquasars , bizarre binary star systems generating high-energy radiation and blasting out jets of particles at nearly the speed of light, live in our Milky Way galaxy . The…
Above the Eye of Hurricane Ivan
Ninety percent of the houses on Grenada were damaged . Such is the destructive force of Hurricane Ivan , already one of the most powerful and destructive hurricanes on record .…
Genesis Mission's Hard Impact
A flying saucer from outer space crash-landed in the Utah desert last week after being tracked by radar and chased by helicopters. No space aliens were involved, however. The…
Identify this Phenomenon
What caused this ring of colors? At the time of this writing, MIT Physics Professor Walter Lewin had yet to find someone who can give the correct explanation. Not students . Not…
Mercury: A Cratered Inferno
Mercury's surface looks similar to our Moon's. Each is heavily cratered and made of rock. Mercury 's diameter is about 4800 km, while the Moon 's is slightly less at about 3500 km…
The Star Trails of Kilimanjaro
The night had no moon, but the stars were out. And camped at 16,000 feet on Mt. Kilimanjaro , photographer Dan Heller recorded this marvelous 3 1/2 hour long exposure. Here the…
Cat's Eye
Staring across interstellar space, the alluring Cat's Eye nebula lies three thousand light-years from Earth. A classic planetary nebula , the Cat's Eye (NGC 6543) represents a…
Sagittarius Triplet
These three bright nebulae are often featured in telescopic tours of the constellation Sagittarius and the view toward the center of our Milky Way galaxy. In fact, 18th century…
Molecular Torus Surrounds Black Hole
Why do some black hole surroundings appear brighter than others? In the centers of active galaxies , supermassive black holes at least thousands of times the mass of our Sun…
A Supernova in Nearby Galaxy NGC 2403
The closest and brightest supernova in over a decade was recorded just over a month ago in the outskirts of nearby galaxy NGC 2403. Officially tagged SN 2004dj , the Type IIP…
Viewing discoveries from 30 September 2004 through 7 September 2004.