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.
Holometer: A Microscope into Space and Time
How different are space and time at very small scales? To explore the unfamiliar domain of the miniscule Planck scale -- where normally unnoticeable quantum effects might become…
Airglow Ripples over Tibet
Why would the sky look like a giant target? Airglow. Following a giant thunderstorm over Bangladesh in late April, giant circular ripples of glowing air appeared over Tibet ,…
Space Shuttle and Space Station Photographed Together
How was this picture taken? Usually, pictures of the shuttle, taken from space, are snapped from the space station. Commonly, pictures of the space station are snapped from the…
The Starry Sky under Hollow Hill
Look up in New Zealand's Hollow Hill Cave and you might think you see a familiar starry sky . And that's exactly what Arachnocampa luminosa are counting on. Captured in this long…
The Wizard Nebula
Open star cluster NGC 7380 is still embedded in its natal cloud of interstellar gas and dust popularly known as the Wizard Nebula . Seen with foreground and background stars along…
Messier 20 and 21
The beautiful Trifid Nebula, also known as Messier 20, is easy to find with a small telescope in the nebula rich constellation Sagittarius. About 5,000 light-years away, the…
Milky Way over Yellowstone
The Milky Way was not created by an evaporating lake. The colorful pool of water, about 10 meters across, is known as Silex Spring and is located in Yellowstone National Park in…
Flying Past Neptune's Moon Triton
What would it look like to fly past Triton, the largest moon of planet Neptune? Only one spacecraft has ever done this -- and now, for the first time, images of this dramatic…
Arp 188 and the Tadpole's Tail
Why does this galaxy have such a long tail? In this stunning vista , based on image data from the Hubble Legacy Archive, distant galaxies form a dramatic backdrop for disrupted…
Mercury's Transit: An Unusual Spot on the Sun
What's that dot on the Sun? If you look closely, it is almost perfectly round. The dot is the result of an unusual type of solar eclipse that occurred in 2006. Usually it is the…
The Spectre of Veszprem
The city of Veszprem, Hungary was only briefly haunted by this mysterious spectre. On the morning of August 11, its monstrous form hovered in the mist above municipal buildings…
Comet Jacques, Heart and Soul
On July 13th, a good place to watch Comet Jacques was from Venus. Then, the recently discovered visitor (C/2014 E2) to the inner solar system passed within about 14.5 million…
Venus and Jupiter at Dawn
On Monday morning, Venus and Jupiter gathered close in dawn skies , for some separated by about half the width of a full moon . It was their closest conjunction since 2000,…
In the Center of the Lagoon Nebula
The center of the Lagoon Nebula is a whirlwind of spectacular star formation. Visible near the image center, at least two long funnel-shaped clouds, each roughly half a light-year…
Contrasting Terrains on Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko
Where should Philae land? As ESA's robotic spacecraft Rosetta circles toward Comet 67P/ Churyumov-Gerasimenko , a decision must eventually be made as to where its mechanical…
Star Trails Over Indonesia
Both land and sky were restless. The unsettled land included erupting Mount Semeru in the distance, the caldera of steaming Mount Bromo on the left, flowing fog , and the lights…
Jupiter and Venus from Earth
It was visible around the world. The sunset conjunction of Jupiter and Venus in 2012 was visible almost no matter where you lived on Earth. Anyone on the planet with a clear…
No X-rays from SN 2014J
Last January, telescopes in observatories around planet Earth were eagerly used to watch the rise of SN 2014J, a bright supernova in nearby galaxy M82 . Still, the most important…
Perseid in Moonlight
Bright moonlight from a Full Moon near perigee illuminates the night and casts shadows in this skyscape from central Iran . Taken on August 12, near the peak of the annual Perseid…
Surreal Moon
Big, bright, and beautiful, a Full Moon near perigee, the closest point in its elliptical orbit around our fair planet , rose on August 10. This remarkable picture records the…
Rings Around the Ring Nebula
It is a familiar sight to sky enthusiasts with even a small telescope. There is much more to the Ring Nebula (M57) , however, than can be seen through a small telescope . The…
Collapse in Hebes Chasma on Mars
What's happened in Hebes Chasma on Mars? Hebes Chasma is a depression just north of the enormous Valles Marineris canyon. Since the depression is unconnected to other surface…
Rosetta Approaches Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko
What does it look like to approach a comet? Early this month humanity received a new rendition as the robotic Rosetta spacecraft went right up to -- and began orbiting -- the…
A Perseid Below
Denizens of planet Earth typically watch meteor showers by looking up. But this remarkable view , captured on August 13, 2011 by astronaut Ron Garan , caught a Perseid meteor by…
Viewing discoveries from 2 September 2014 through 10 August 2014.