Official Space is Awesome Thread

[Argonne69]

Arp 107, two interacting galaxies, captured by JWST ~465 million light-years away.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

 

[Argonne69]

A recent Venus flyby pushed the Solar Orbiter spacecraft out of Earth's orbital plane, allowing it to gaze at the solar poles for the first time. Our view of the star is limited by Earth’s orbital plane, which allows us to observe the Sun’s equator head-on while its polar regions remain hidden. 

 

 

Image: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI Team

 

 

Image: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI Team, D. Berghmans

 

 

[Argonne69]

A close-up of the Horsehead Nebula taken by the JWST. It's located ~1,300 light-years away in the Orion B molecular cloud.

 

 

Image: ESA/Webb, NASA, CSA, K. Misselt, and Abergel

 

[Argonne69]

Another fine pic of the Crab Nebula, a supernova remnant located 6,500 light-years away in the constellation Taurus. This is a combined image from JWST and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. The pulsar in its center spins at 30 time per second.

 

 

Image: NASA/CXC/SAO/STScI/SAO/J. Major

 

[Argonne69]

Hubble snaps a photo of the five largest moons of Uranus.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, C. Soto, J. DePasquale

 

[Argonne69]

ESO's Very Large Telescope captured this image of the Sculptor Galaxy (Caldwell 65) 11 million light-years away.

 

 

Image: ESO/E. Congiu et al

 

 

Image: ESO/E. Congiu et al

 

[Argonne69]

The Vera C. Rubin observatory under the night sky in the Andes mountains of northern Chile.

 

 

Image: RubinObs/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/B. Quint

 

[JungleJimbo]

18 hours ago, Argonne69 said:

The Vera C. Rubin observatory under the night sky in the Andes mountains of northern Chile.

 

 

Image: RubinObs/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/B. Quint

 

 

I heard BBC WOrld Service today, referring to this Chile observatory as being powerful enough to resolve "objects as small as a golf ball on the Moon"

... and my thoughts turned to @Argonne69's efforts here, to educate/ share these awe-inspiring photos with us.  Thanks Arg.

 

Vera Rubin: First celestial image from revolutionary telescope [BBC]

 

 

Edited June 23 by JungleJimbo

[Argonne69]

The Trifid nebula (top right) and the Lagoon nebula (bottom) combines 678 separate images taken by NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory in just over seven hours of observing time.

 

 

Image: NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory

 

[Argonne69]

A small section of the Rubin observatory’s total view of the Virgo cluster shows two prominent spiral galaxies (lower right), three merging galaxies (upper right), several groups of distant galaxies, many stars in the Milky Way galaxy, and more.

 

 

Image: NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory

 

[Argonne69]

A composite image of the Andromeda galaxy combining different wavelengths of light. 

 

 

Image: X-ray: NASA/CXO/UMass/Z. Li & Q.D. Wang, ESA/XMM-Newton; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE, Spitzer, NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Gordon (U. Az), ESA/Herschel, ESA/Planck, NASA/IRAS, NASA/COBE; Radio: NSF/GBT/WSRT/IRAM/C. Clark (STScI); Ultraviolet: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GALEX; Optical: Andromeda, Unexpected © Marcel Drechsler, Xavier Strottner, Yann Sainty & J. Sahner, T. Kottary. Composite image processing: L. Frattare, K. Arcand, J.Major

 

 

Image: X-ray: NASA/CXO/UMass/Z. Li & Q.D. Wang, ESA/XMM-Newton; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE, Spitzer, NASA/JPL-Caltech/K. Gordon (U. Az), ESA/Herschel, ESA/Planck, NASA/IRAS, NASA/COBE; Radio: NSF/GBT/WSRT/IRAM/C. Clark (STScI); Ultraviolet: NASA/JPL-Caltech/GALEX; Optical: Andromeda, Unexpected © Marcel Drechsler, Xavier Strottner, Yann Sainty & J. Sahner, T. Kottary. Composite image processing: L. Frattare, K. Arcand, J.Major

 

[Argonne69]

The Serpens Nebula is located ~1,300 light-years away in the constellation Serpens.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, K. Pontoppidan, J. Green

 

 

[Argonne69]

The "double detonation" supernova remnant SNR 0509-67.5 captured with ESO’s Very Large Telescope.

 

 

Image: ESO/P. Das et al. K. Noll et al.

 

[JungleJimbo]

2 hours ago, Argonne69 said:

The "double detonation" supernova remnant SNR 0509-67.5 captured with ESO’s Very Large Telescope.

 

 

Image: ESO/P. Das et al. K. Noll et al.

 

 

Looks like a psychedelic soap bubble! 

• https://www.newscientist.com/article/2486512-stunning-image-of-a-supernova-reveals-a-dead-star-that-exploded-twice/ 
• https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/07/new-evidence-that-some-supernovae-may-be-a-double-detonation/ 

[Argonne69]

Newborn star HH 211, located ~1,000 light-years away in the Perseus constellation, shoots out supersonic streams of gas and dust into space.

 

 

Image: ESA/Webb, NASA, CSA, T. Ray

 

[Argonne69]

The interstellar atomic hydrogen clouds of the 1,630-light-year-wide nebula N79. It is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. 

 

 

Image: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, O. Nayak, M. Meixner

 

[Argonne69]

The "Mountains" of the Carina Nebula. Located ~7,600 light-years away, and lit up by the radiation of baby stars, it's one of the most active star-forming regions ever discovered.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

 

[Jeff58]

Not photogenic, but…

 

[JungleJimbo]

5 minutes ago, Jeff58 said:

Not photogenic, but…

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Argonne69]

JWST images Stephan’s Quintet. It is located ~290 million light-years away in the constellation Pegasus. It was the first compact galaxy group ever discovered in 1877.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

 

[Argonne69]

The closest images of the Sun ever taken. These images from the Parker Solar Probe’s record-setting pass by the Sun late last year were released by NASA a few days ago.

 

 

Image: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/J. Ng

 

[Argonne69]

JWST images the Southern Ring Nebula (NGC 3132), also called the "Eight-Burst nebula" for its figure-eight shape. It is located 2,500 light years away. The diameter of the cloud of gas and dust in this planetary nebula is 1/2 light-year. 

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

 

[Argonne69]

The first-ever baby pictures of a solar system that’s not our own. HOPS-315, a newborn star located 1,300 light-years away where astronomers have observed evidence for the earliest stages of planet formation. The image was taken with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile.

 

 

Image: ALMA(ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)/M. McClure et al.

 

[JungleJimbo]

46 minutes ago, Argonne69 said:

The first-ever baby pictures of a solar system that’s not our own. HOPS-315, a newborn star located 1,300 light-years away where astronomers have observed evidence for the earliest stages of planet formation. The image was taken with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile.

 

 

Image: ALMA(ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)/M. McClure et al.

 

 

 

Image = Reminds me of the Sistine Chapel

 

[Argonne69]

In the center of many galaxies, giant balloon-like structures of high-energy radiation extend thousands of light-years above and below the galaxy's plane. Known as the Fermi bubbles, the massive lobes may have been the result of a violent outburst in the galaxy’s recent past. Each lobe of the Fermi bubbles is ~25,000 light-years tall. 

 

 

Image: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

 

[57charlie]

On 6/22/2025 at 11:25 PM, JungleJimbo said:

 

I heard BBC WOrld Service today, referring to this Chile observatory as being powerful enough to resolve "objects as small as a golf ball on the Moon"

... and my thoughts turned to @Argonne69's efforts here, to educate/ share these awe-inspiring photos with us.  Thanks Arg.

 

Vera Rubin: First celestial image from revolutionary telescope [BBC]

 

 

Well, maybe they can point it up to the Apollo 14 landing site to see if it was a couple of Top-Flite balls that Alan Shepard hit. 

[57charlie]

On 7/10/2025 at 8:47 PM, Jeff58 said:

Not photogenic, but…

 

I'm thinking that this newly discovered interstellar object (comet?) may be the discovery of the year. Can't wait till it gets closer and scientists can put all the resources available onto it and get some really good close-ups of it.

[Jeff58]

24 minutes ago, 57charlie said:

I'm thinking that this newly discovered interstellar object (comet?) may be the discovery of the year. Can't wait till it gets closer and scientists can put all the resources available onto it and get some really good close-ups of it.

If the object is loosing material due to solar radiation, it should be possible to get spectroscopy from it.
 

It won’t be thought of in time or accomplished, what would be useful here is a kinetic kill vehicle in the Brilliant Pebbles mode. If we can intercept and damage it to the point that material is disrupted, it may be possible to collect it. Now that would be something.

[Argonne69]

Astronomers have confirmed the existence of a companion star in a tight orbit around Betelgeuse, resolving a long-standing mystery about the star’s varying brightness. The companion star has a mass ~1.5 times that of the Sun.

 

 

Image:  International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/M. Zamani

 

[Argonne69]

Webb's deep field. JWST's debut image was the deepest and most detailed image of the universe ever taken.

 

 

Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI