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.
Galaxies in the River
Large galaxies grow by eating small ones. Even our own galaxy engages in a sort of galactic cannibalism , absorbing small galaxies that are too close and are captured by the Milky…
IC 4628: The Prawn Nebula
South of Antares , in the tail of the nebula-rich constellation Scorpius , lies emission nebula IC 4628. Nearby hot, massive stars , millions of years young, irradiate the nebula…
The Eagle Nebula with X-ray Hot Stars
What do the famous Eagle Nebula star pillars look like in X-ray light? To find out, NASA's orbiting Chandra X-ray Observatory peered in and through these interstellar mountains of…
Chemicals Glow as a Meteor Disintegrates
Meteors can be colorful. While the human eye usually cannot discern many colors, cameras often can. Pictured here is a fireball , a disintegrating meteor that was not only one of…
The Antikythera Mechanism
It does what? No one knew that 2,000 years ago, the technology existed to build such a device. The Antikythera mechanism , pictured, is now widely regarded as the first computer .…
Apollo 11: Armstrong's Lunar Selfie
A photograph of Buzz Aldrin standing on the Moon taken by Neil Armstrong , was digitally reversed to create this lunar selfie. Captured in July 1969 following the Apollo 11 moon…
Galactic Cirrus: Mandel Wilson 9
The combined light of stars along the Milky Way are reflected by these cosmic dust clouds that soar 300 light-years or so above the plane of our galaxy. Known to some as…
M64: The Black Eye Galaxy Close Up
This magnificent spiral galaxy is Messier 64 , often called the Black Eye Galaxy or the Sleeping Beauty Galaxy for its dark-lidded appearance in telescopic views. The spiral's…
Chandrayaan-3 Launches to the Moon
Birds don't fly this high. Airplanes don't go this fast. The Statue of Liberty weighs less. No species other than human can even comprehend what is going on , nor could any human…
Milky Way above La Palma Observatory
What's happening in the night sky? To help find out, telescopes all over the globe will be pointing into deep space. Investigations will include trying to understand the early…
Shells and Arcs around Star CW Leonis
What's happening around this star? No one is sure. CW Leonis is the closest carbon star , a star that appears orange because of atmospheric carbon dispersed from interior nuclear…
Meteor and Milky Way over the Alps
Now this was a view with a thrill. From Mount Tschirgant in the Alps , you can see not only nearby towns and distant Tyrol ean peaks, but also, weather permitting, stars, nebulas,…
Webb's First Deep Field
This stunning infrared image was released one year ago as the James Webb Space Telescope began its exploration of the cosmos. The view of the early Universe toward the southern…
Comet C/2023 E1 ATLAS near Perihelion
Comet C/2023 E1 (ATLAS) was just spotted in March, another comet found by the NASA funded Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System. On July 1 this Comet ATLAS reached…
Webb's Rho Ophiuchi
A mere 390 light-years away , Sun-like stars and future planetary systems are forming in the Rho Ophiuchi molecular cloud complex, the closest star-forming region to our fair…
Rings and Bar of Spiral Galaxy NGC 1398
Why do some spiral galaxies have a ring around the center? Spiral galaxy NGC 1398 not only has a ring of pearly stars, gas and dust around its center, but a bar of stars and gas…
Sunspots on an Active Sun
Why is our Sun so active now ? No one is sure. An increase in surface activity was expected because our Sun is approaching solar maximum in 2025. However, last month our Sun…
Stars, Dust and Nebula in NGC 6559
When stars form, pandemonium reigns. A textbook case is the star forming region NGC 6559 . Visible in the featured image are red glowing emission nebula s of hydrogen , blue…
Doomed Star Eta Carinae
Eta Carinae may be about to explode. But no one knows when - it may be next year, it may be one million years from now. Eta Carinae 's mass - about 100 times greater than our Sun…
Stickney Crater
Stickney Crater, the largest crater on the martian moon Phobos, is named for Chloe Angeline Stickney Hall, mathematician and wife of astronomer Asaph Hall. Asaph Hall discovered…
The Double Cluster in Perseus
This pretty starfield spans about three full moons (1.5 degrees) across the heroic northern constellation of Perseus . It holds the famous pair of open star clusters , h and Chi…
Fireworks vs Supermoon
On July 4, an almost Full Moon rose in planet Earth's evening skies. Also known as a Buck Moon, the full lunar phase ( full on July 3 at 11:39 UTC) was near perigee, the closest…
A Map of the Observable Universe
What if you could see out to the edge of the observable universe ? You would see galaxies, galaxies, galaxies, and then, well, quasar s, which are the bright centers of distant…
Aurora over Icelandic Waterfall
It seemed like the sky exploded. The original idea was to photograph an aurora over a waterfall. After waiting for hours under opaque clouds , though, hope was running out. Others…
Viewing discoveries from 27 July 2023 through 4 July 2023.