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.
The Holographic Principle
Is this picture worth a thousand words? According to the Holographic Principle , the most information you can get from this image is about 3 x 1065 bits for a normal sized…
Summer Night in Astronomy Town
This serene view records a late summer night sky over the rolling, green hills of planet Earth. It was taken near the rural village of Saadat Shahr, Fars province, in southern…
Stephan's Quintet
The first identified compact galaxy group, Stephan's Quintet is featured in this stunning image from the newly upgraded Hubble Space Telescope. About 300 million light-years away,…
The Butterfly Nebula from Upgraded Hubble
The bright clusters and nebulae of planet Earth's night sky are often named for flowers or insects , and NGC 6302 is no exception. With an estimated surface temperature of about…
Star Trails Over Oregon
As the Earth spins on its axis, the sky seems to rotate around us. This motion, called diurnal motion , produces the beautiful concentric trails traced by stars during time…
Unexpected Impact on Jupiter
Two months ago, something unexpected hit Jupiter. First discovered by an amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley on 2009 July 19, the impact was quickly confirmed and even imaged by the…
Jupiter Over the Mediterranean
This vacation included a sight to remember. Pictured above, a picturesque starscape capped a serene seascape as seen from Turkey this past August. In the above digitally stitched…
CMBR Dipole: Speeding Through the Universe
Our Earth is not at rest. The Earth moves around the Sun . The Sun orbits the center of the Milky Way Galaxy . The Milky Way Galaxy orbits in the Local Group of Galaxies . The…
Supernova Remnant E0102-72
The expanding debris cloud from the explosion of a massive star is captured in this multiwavelength composite , combining x-ray and optical images from the Chandra and Hubble…
6 Years of Saturn
Today, planet Earth passes through the plane of Saturn's rings . From the perspective of earthbound astronomers , Saturn's rings will be edge-on. The problem is, Saturn itself is…
Despina, Moon of Neptune
Despina is a tiny moon of Neptune . A mere 148 kilometers across, diminutive Despina was discovered in 1989, in images from the Voyager 2 spacecraft taken during its encounter…
Discovery's Rainbow
Just one minute before midnight EDT, Friday, August 28, the Space Shuttle Discovery began a long arc into a cloudy sky. Following the launch, a bright and remarkably colorful…
Shadows of Saturn at Equinox
Unusual shadows and dark rings appeared around Saturn near its equinox last month. At that time -- early August -- Saturn's ring plane pointed directly at the Sun. Visible above ,…
Open Cluster M25
Many stars like our Sun were formed in open clusters. The above pictured open cluster, M25 , contains thousands of stars and is about two thousand light years distant . The stars…
D. rad Bacteria: Candidate Astronauts
These bacteria could survive on another planet. In an Earth lab, Deinococcus radiodurans (D. rad) survive extreme levels of radiation , extreme temperatures, dehydration , and…
NGC 7771 Galaxy Group
Slide your cursor over the image to identify three members of this intriguing gathering of galaxies . Known as the NGC 7771 Group, they lie almost 200 million light-years away…
NGC 7822 in Cepheus
Pillars of gas, dust, and young, hot stars fill the center of NGC 7822. At the edge of a giant molecular cloud toward the northern constellation Cepheus , the glowing star forming…
A Dark Sky Over Sequoia National Park
Scroll right to take in the view from the highest summit in the contiguous USA. The above 360-degree digitally stitched panorama, taken in mid-July, shows the view from…
Classic Orion Nebulae
The Great Nebula in Orion , also known as M42, is one of the most famous nebulae in the sky. The star forming region's glowing gas clouds and hot young stars are near the center…
Equinox at Saturn
What would Saturn's rings look like if the ring plane pointed directly at the Sun? That situation occurred earlier this month when equinox occurred on Saturn. Since the Earth is…
Morning Glory Clouds Over Australia
What causes these long, strange clouds? No one is sure. A rare type of cloud known as a Morning Glory cloud can stretch 1,000 kilometers long and occur at altitudes up to two…
Giant Cluster Bends, Breaks Images
What are those strange blue objects? Many of the brightest blue images are of a single, unusual, beaded, blue, ring-like galaxy which just happens to line-up behind a giant…
The Gum Nebula
Named for Australian astronomer Colin Stanley Gum (1924-1960), The Gum Nebula is so large and close it is actually hard to see. In fact , we are only about 450 light-years from…
The Whale and the Hockey Stick
NGC 4631 is a big beautiful spiral galaxy seen edge-on (top right) only 25 million light-years away towards the small northern constellation Canes Venatici . This galaxy's…
Viewing discoveries from 13 September 2009 through 21 August 2009.