Browse NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day archive by date and media: Archive Discoveries
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Noctilucent Clouds over Paris
It's northern noctilucent cloud season. Composed of small ice crystals forming only during specific conditions in the upper atmosphere, noctilucent clouds may become visible at…
Andromeda over the Sahara Desert
What is the oldest thing you can see? At 2.5 million light years distant, the answer for the unaided eye is the Andromeda galaxy , because its photons are 2.5 million years old…
In the Center of the Cat's Eye Nebula
Three thousand light-years away, a dying star throws off shells of glowing gas. This image from the Hubble Space Telescope reveals the Cat's Eye Nebula (NGC 6543), to be one of…
Saturn and the ISS
Soaring high in skies around planet Earth, bright planet Saturn was a star of June's morning planet parade . But very briefly on June 24 it posed with a bright object in low Earth…
Roots on a Rotating Planet
With roots on a rotating planet, an old tree is centered in this sequence of 137 exposures each 20 seconds long, recorded one night from northern Sicily. Digital camera and…
The NGC 6914 Complex
A study in contrasts, this colorful skyscape features stars, dust, and glowing gas in the vicinity of NGC 6914. The interstellar complex of nebulae lies some 6,000 light-years…
Milky Way Motion in 3D from Gaia
Our sky is alive with the streams of stars. The motions of 26 million Milky Way stars are evident in the featured map constructed from recent data taken by ESA 's Gaia satellite .…
A Molten Galaxy Einstein Ring
It is difficult to hide a galaxy behind a cluster of galaxies. The closer cluster's gravity will act like a huge lens , pulling images of the distant galaxy around the sides and…
Strawberry Supermoon Over Devil's Saddle
Near the horizon the full moon often seems to loom large, swollen in appearance by the famous Moon illusion . But time-lapse image sequences demonstrate that the Moon's angular…
Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
This moon is doomed. Mars , the red planet named for the Roman god of war , has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos , whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic .…
Solargraphic Analemmas
For the northern hemisphere June 21 was the summer solstice, the Sun reaching its northernmost declination for the year. That would put it at the top of each of these three…
The Solar System's Planet Trails
Stars trail through a clear morning sky in this postcard from a rotating planet . The timelapse image is constructed from consecutive exposures made over nearly three hours with a…
Comet C/2017 K2 (PanSTARRS)
Imaged on June 20 2022, comet C/2017 K2 (PanSTARRS) shares this wide telescopic field of view with open star cluster IC 4665 and bright star Beta Ophiuchi, near a starry edge of…
Solar System Family Portrait
Yes, but have you ever seen all of the planets at once? A rare roll-call of planets has been occurring in the morning sky for much of June . The featured fisheye all-sky image ,…
Mercury from Passing BepiColombo
Which part of the Moon is this? No part -- because this is the planet Mercury . Mercury's old surface is heavily cratered like that of Earth's Moon . Mercury, while only slightly…
The Gum Nebula over Snowy Mountains
The Gum Nebula is so large and close it is actually hard to see . This interstellar expanse of glowing hydrogen gas frequently evades notice because it spans 35 degrees -- over 70…
Light Echoes from V838 Mon
What caused this outburst of V838 Mon? For reasons unknown, star V838 Mon 's outer surface suddenly greatly expanded with the result that it became one of the brighter stars in…
Planets of the Solar System
Simultaneous images from four cameras were combined to construct this atmospheric predawn skyscape. The cooperative astro-panorama captures all the planets of the Solar System ,…
Filaprom on the Western Limb
A solar filament is an enormous stream of incandescent plasma suspended above the active surface of the Sun by looping magnetic fields. Seen against the solar disk it looks dark…
Spiral Galaxy NGC 6744
Beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 6744 is nearly 175,000 light-years across, larger than our own Milky Way . It lies some 30 million light-years distant in the southern constellation…
Supernova Remnant: The Veil Nebula
Ten thousand years ago, before the dawn of recorded human history , a new light would have suddenly have appeared in the night sky and faded after a few weeks. Today we know this…
Analemma over Taipei
Does the Sun return to the same spot on the sky every day? No. A better and more visual answer to that question is an analemma , a composite of images taken at the same time and…
Rock Fingers on Mars
There, just right of center, what is that? The surface of Mars keeps revealing new surprises with the recent discovery of finger-like rock spires. The small nearly-vertical rock…
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Game: Super Planet Crash
Can you create a planetary system that lasts for 1000 years? Super Planet Crash, the featured game, allows you to try. To create up to ten planets, just click anywhere near the…
Viewing discoveries from 12 July 2022 through 19 June 2022.