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.
Mystery Feature Now Disappears in Titan Lake
What is that changing object in a cold hydrocarbon sea of Titan? Radar images from the robotic Cassini spacecraft orbiting Saturn have been recording the surface of the…
A Solar Prominence Eruption from SDO
One of the most spectacular solar sights is an erupting prominence. In 2011, NASA's Sun-orbiting Solar Dynamic Observatory spacecraft imaged an impressively large prominence…
Cities at Night
Looking toward the south from an altitude of 400 kilometers, this stunning snapshot from orbit finds bright lights of Tokyo and cities across central and southern Japan, planet…
Sculptor Galaxy NGC 134
NGC 134 is probably not the best known spiral galaxy in the constellation Sculptor . Still, the tantalizing island universe is a clearly a telescopic treasure in southern skies.…
Moons and Jupiter
Some of the Solar System's largest moons rose together on February 23. On that night, a twilight pairing of a waning gibbous Moon and Jupiter was captured in this sharp telescopic…
Unusual Clouds over Hong Kong
What's that in the sky? Earlier this month, in the sky high above Hong Kong , China , not just one unusual type of cloud appeared -- but two. In the foreground was a long…
NGC 3310: A Starburst Spiral Galaxy
The party is still going on in spiral galaxy NGC 3310. Roughly 100 million years ago, NGC 3310 likely collided with a smaller galaxy causing the large spiral galaxy to light up…
Julius Caesar and Leap Days
Today, February 29th, is a leap day - a relatively rare occurrence. In 46 BC, Julius Caesar , featured here in a self-decreed minted coin, created a calendar system that added one…
IC 1848: The Soul Nebula
Stars are forming in the Soul of the Queen of Aethopia. More specifically, a large star forming region called the Soul Nebula can be found in the direction of the constellation…
Northern Pluto
Gaze across the frozen canyons of northern Pluto in this contrast enhanced color scene, imaged last July by the New Horizons spacecraft. Currently known as Lowell Regio, the…
The Tarantula Nebula
The Tarantula Nebula is more than a thousand light-years in diameter, a giant star forming region within nearby satellite galaxy the Large Magellanic Cloud , about 180 thousand…
Highest, Tallest, and Closest to the Stars
Fans of planet Earth probably recognize its highest mountain, the Himalayan Mount Everest , on the left in this 3-panel skyscape of The World at Night. Shrouded in cloud Everest's…
USA's Northeast Megalopolis from Space
Can you identify a familiar area in the northeast USA just from nighttime lights? It might be possible because many major cities are visible, including (right to left) New York ,…
A Supernova through Galaxy Dust
Telescopes around the world are tracking a bright supernova that occurred in a nearby dusty galaxy. The powerful stellar explosion was first noted earlier this month. The nearby…
Flying Over Pluto's Moon Charon
Given some poetic license, there is now scientific evidence that hell has frozen over. To start, Greek mythology holds that Charon) is the ferryman of the underworld. Next, recent…
M82: Galaxy with a Supergalactic Wind
What's lighting up the Cigar Galaxy? M82 , as this irregular galaxy is also known, was stirred up by a recent pass near large spiral galaxy M81 . This doesn't fully explain the…
Where Your Shadow Has Company
Want to take a relaxing interstellar vacation ? Consider visiting Kepler-16b , a world in a binary star system. In fact Kepler-16b is the first discovered circumbinary planet . It…
NGC 2403 in Camelopardalis
Magnificent island universe NGC 2403 stands within the boundaries of the long-necked constellation Camelopardalis . Some 10 million light-years distant and about 50,000…
Hitomi Launches
On February 17 at 5:45pm JST this H-IIA rocket blasted skyward from JAXA's Tanegashima Space Center located off the southern coast of Japan, planet Earth. Onboard was the ASTRO-H…
Milky Way over the Pinnacles in Australia
What strange world is this? E a r t h . In the foreground of the featured image are the Pinnacles , unusual rock spires in Nambung National Park in Western Australia . Made of…
Star Forming Region S106
Massive star IRS 4 is beginning to spread its wings. Born only about 100,000 years ago, material streaming out from this newborn star has formed the nebula dubbed Sharpless 2-106…
White Rock Fingers on Mars
What caused this unusual light rock formation on Mars? Intrigued by the possibility that they could be salt deposits left over as an ancient lakebed dried-up , detailed studies of…
A Heart Shaped Lenticular Cloud
Can a cloud love a mountain? Perhaps not, but on a Valentine's Day like today, one might be prone to seeing heart-shaped symbols where they don't actually exist. A fleeting…
Yutu on a Little Planet
Tracks lead to a small robot perched near the top of this bright little planet. Of course, the planet is really the Moon. The robot is the desk-sized Yutu rover, leaving its…
Viewing discoveries from 7 March 2016 through 13 February 2016.