Tag: Milky Way

A Northern Winter Sky Panorama

What stars shine in Earth’s northern hemisphere during winter? The featured image highlights a number of bright stars visible earlier this month. The image is a 360-degree horizontal-composite panorama of 66 vertical frames taken consecutively with the same camera and...

/ December 24, 2019

Decorating the Sky

Bright stars, clouds of dust and glowing nebulae decorate this cosmic scene, a skyscape just north of Orion’s belt. Close to the plane of our Milky Way galaxy, the wide field view spans about 5.5 degrees. Striking bluish M78, a...

/ December 12, 2019

N63A: Supernova Remnant in Visible and X-ray

What has this supernova left behind? As little as 2,000 years ago, light from a massive stellar explosion in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) first reached planet Earth. The LMC is a close galactic neighbor of our Milky Way Galaxy...

/ December 11, 2019

Geminid Meteors over Chile

Are meteors streaming out from a point in the sky? Yes, in a way. When the Earth crosses a stream of Sun-orbiting meteors, these meteors appear to come from the direction of the stream — with the directional point called...

/ December 8, 2019

Milky Way and Planets Near Opposition

In this early May night skyscape, a mountain road near Bursa, Turkey seems to lead toward bright planets Mars and Saturn and the center of our Milky Way Galaxy, a direction nearly opposite the Sun in planet Earth’s sky. The...

/ May 23, 2016

Milky Way Over Quiver Tree Forest

In front of a famous background of stars and galaxies lies some of Earth’s more unusual trees. Known as quiver trees, they are actually succulentaloe plants that can grow to tree-like proportions. The quiver tree name is derived from the...

/ May 16, 2016

Saturn and Mars visit Milky Way Star Clouds

After recently getting a telescope for my birthday I’m awaiting a clear night in the UK to gaze upon Mars and Saturn late at night. While I’m not sure my entry level scope can gather such amazing images, I’m excited...

/ May 13, 2016

Milky Way over the Pinnacles in Australia

This was my favourite view growing up in Australia. It was a fair distance away from where this picture was taken in a small town called Darwin, but the view was equally as spectacular on a clear night sky when...

/ February 18, 2016

Galaxies in the River

Just like large animals grow by eating smaller ones on Earth, our Milky Way galaxy grows by eating other smaller galaxies in the area. This isn’t a local phenomenon either, it happens throughout the Universe like a desperate monopoly player...

/ February 16, 2016
NGC 1300

Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1300

Big, beautiful, barred spiral galaxy NGC 1300 lies some 70 million light-years away on the banks of the constellation Eridanus. This Hubble Space Telescope composite view of the gorgeous island universe is one of the largest Hubble images ever made...

/ January 10, 2016