Browse NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day archive by date and media: Archive Discoveries
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NGC 7380: The Wizard Nebula
What powers are being wielded in the Wizard Nebula? Gravitation strong enough to form stars, and stellar winds and radiations powerful enough to create and dissolve towers of gas…
Flying Saucer Crash Lands in Utah Desert
A flying saucer from outer space crash-landed in the Utah desert after being tracked by radar and chased by helicopters. The year was 2004, and no space aliens were involved. The…
Eclipse in the City
A darker Moon sets over Manhattan in this night skyscape. The 16 frame composite was assembled from consecutive exposures recorded during the November 8 total lunar eclipse . In…
Blood Moon, Ice Giant
On November 8 the Full Moon turned blood red as it slid through Earth's shadow in a beautiful total lunar eclipse. During totality it also passed in front of, or occulted, outer…
Total Lunar Eclipse
The beginning, middle, and end of a journey through planet Earth's colorful umbral shadow is captured in this timelapse composite image of a total lunar eclipse . Taken on…
The Asymmetric Nebula Surrounding Wolf-Rayet Star 18
Why does the nebula around the star WR-18 shine brighter on one side? Also known as NGC 3199 , this active star and its surrounding nebula lie about 12,000 light-years away toward…
Galaxies: Wild's Triplet from Hubble
How many galaxies are interacting here? This grouping of galaxies is called the Wild Triplet , not only for the discoverer , but for the number of bright galaxies that appear. It…
Dark Ball in Inverted Starfield
Does this strange dark ball look somehow familiar? If so, that might be because it is our Sun. In the featured image from 2012, a detailed solar view was captured originally in a…
Lunar Eclipse at the South Pole
Last May 16 the Moon slid through Earth's shadow, completely immersed in the planet's dark umbra for about 1 hour and 25 minutes during a total lunar eclipse. In this composited…
InSight's Final Selfie
The Mars InSight lander returned its first image from the Red Planet's flat, equatorial Elysium Planitia after a successful touchdown on November 26, 2018. The history making…
M33: The Triangulum Galaxy
The small, northern constellation Triangulum harbors this magnificent face-on spiral galaxy, M33. Its popular names include the Pinwheel Galaxy or just the Triangulum Galaxy . M33…
NGC 6357: The Lobster Nebula
Why is the Lobster Nebula forming some of the most massive stars known? No one is yet sure . Cataloged as NGC 6357, the Lobster Nebula houses the open star cluster Pismis 24 near…
LDN 43: The Cosmic Bat Nebula
What is the most spook-tacular nebula in the galaxy? One contender is LDN 43, which bears an astonishing resemblance to a vast cosmic bat flying amongst the stars on a dark…
Night on a Spooky Planet
What spooky planet is this ? Planet Earth of course, on a dark and stormy night in 2013 at Hverir , a geothermally active area along the volcanic landscape in northeastern Iceland…
LDN 673: Dark Clouds in Aquila
Part of a dark expanse that splits the crowded plane of our Milky Way galaxy, the Aquila Rift arcs through planet Earth's skies near bright star Altair . In eerie silhouette…
Seven Years of Halley Dust
History's first known periodic comet Halley (1P/Halley) returns to the inner Solar System every 75 years or so. The famous comet made its last appearance to the naked-eye in 1986.…
Sunset, Moonset, Taj Mahal
On October 25th, Sun and New Moon set together as seen from Agra, India. Their close conjunction near the western horizon, a partial solar eclipse, was captured in this elevated…
Cocoon Nebula Wide Field
When does a nebula look like a comet? In this crowded starfield , covering over two degrees within the high flying constellation of the Swan ( Cygnus ), the eye is drawn to the…
Clouds Around Galaxy Andromeda
What are those red clouds surrounding the Andromeda galaxy? This galaxy, M31 , is often imaged by planet Earth-based astronomers. As the nearest large spiral galaxy, it is a…
Milky Way and Zodiacal Light over Australian Pinnacles
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…
NGC 1499: The California Nebula
Drifting through the Orion Arm of the spiral Milky Way Galaxy, this cosmic cloud by chance echoes the outline of California on the west coast of the United States. Our own Sun…
Andromeda in Southern Skies
Looking north from southern New Zealand , the Andromeda Galaxy never gets more than about five degrees above the horizon. As spring comes to the southern hemisphere, in late…
Pillars of Creation
A now famous picture from the Hubble Space Telescope featured these star forming columns of cold gas and dust light-years long inside M16, the Eagle Nebula, dubbed the Pillars of…
A Galaxy Beyond Stars, Gas, Dust
Do we dare believe our eyes? When we look at images of space, we often wonder whether they are "real", and just as often the best answer varies. In this case, the image was…
Viewing discoveries from 14 November 2022 through 19 October 2022.