Picture This – Page 35 – Astronomy Now

Dazzling spiral with an active heart

5 July 2017 Astronomy Now

ESO’s Very Large Telescope has captured a magnificent face-on view of the barred spiral galaxy Messier 77. The image does justice to the galaxy’s beauty, showcasing its glittering arms criss-crossed with dust lanes — but it fails to betray Messier 77’s turbulent nature.

See the sharpest-ever view of giant Betelgeuse

30 June 2017 Astronomy Now

This orange blob shows the nearby star Betelgeuse, as seen by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array. This is the first time that ALMA has ever observed the surface of a star and this first attempt has resulted in the highest-resolution image of Betelgeuse available.

Jupiter’s “String of Pearls”

26 June 2017 Astronomy Now

This enhanced-color image of Jupiter’s bands of light and dark clouds was created by citizen scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran using data from the JunoCam imager on NASA’s Juno spacecraft.

Martian crater provides reminder of Apollo moonwalk

19 June 2017 Astronomy Now

NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity passed near a young crater this spring during the 45th anniversary of Apollo 16’s trip to Earth’s moon, prompting a connection between two missions.

Titan’s north pole in summertime

16 June 2017 Astronomy Now

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft captured this view of bright methane clouds drifting in the summer skies of Saturn’s moon Titan, along with dark hydrocarbon lakes and seas clustered around the north pole.

Hubble applauds waltzing dwarfs

11 June 2017 Astronomy Now

Italian astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope have tracked the rhythmic movement of two brown dwarf stars across the sky.

Ride with NASA’s Juno orbiter over turbulent Jupiter

30 May 2017 Stephen Clark

Take a trip around Jupiter with NASA’s Juno spacecraft in a time-lapse animation created from a sequence of images taken during the probe’s last close-up flyby of the gas giant May 19.

Observatories combine to crack open the Crab Nebula

12 May 2017 Astronomy Now

Astronomers have produced a highly detailed image of the Crab Nebula, by combining data from telescopes spanning nearly the entire breadth of the electromagnetic spectrum, from radio waves to X-rays.

A lot of galaxies need guarding in this Hubble view

8 May 2017 Astronomy Now

Like the quirky characters in the upcoming film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has some amazing superpowers, specifically when it comes to observing galaxies across time and space. One stunning example is galaxy cluster Abell 370, which contains a vast assortment of several hundred galaxies tied together by the mutual pull of gravity.

Approaching Jupiter

6 May 2017 Astronomy Now

This enhanced colour view of Jupiter’s south pole was created by citizen scientist Gabriel Fiset using data from the JunoCam instrument on NASA’s Juno spacecraft.