spacetelescope

spacetelescope, 10 days ago to Astronomy

Happy June! Together, the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes present a colorful view of the Orion Nebula’s dynamic star-forming environment in ultraviolet, infrared, and visible light. Credit: NASA, ESA, STscI. #astronomy

spacetelescope, 10 days ago to random

Reach for the sky! 🙌

In 2019, Hubble observed spiral galaxy NGC 2276. Its lopsided state is due to the gravitational pull of a galaxy nearby, which is stretching NGC 2276’s spiral arms. It’s a good reminder that galaxies interact with their surroundings: https://bit.ly/4bFeuxp

spacetelescope, 6 days ago to random

Carbon is essential for life as we know it, so naturally astronomers are seeking this element around other stars. A team using #NASAWebb found a protoplanetary disk with the largest number of unique carbon-bearing molecules ever detected: https://webbtelescope.pub/4c19uTY

spacetelescope, 8 days ago to random

“The potentially habitable worlds the James Webb Space Telescope is observing are all transiting exoplanets, meaning their orbits are nearly edge-on so that they pass in front of their host stars."
https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/2024/06/05/reconnaissance-of-potentially-habitable-worlds-with-nasas-webb/

spacetelescope, 8 days ago to Astronomy

The spiral galaxy at the top left of this image, nicknamed the “Comet Galaxy” shows what can happen when a galaxy falls into a cluster. The galaxy cluster stripped and pushed away the Comet Galaxy’s gas, creating its gaseous tail: https://bit.ly/3y9MJyJ #astronomy

spacetelescope, 9 days ago to random

"We have a true appreciation of the combination of science and art and how it enhances everybody's view of the universe," said Dr. Frank Summers, a principal visualization scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute.
https://www.wbaltv.com/article/poly-students-art-inspired-james-webb-space-telescope/60981173

spacetelescope, 13 days ago to random

This is no average star field. Most of the stars you see here, about 300,000 of them, are not in our Milky Way but our neighbor, the Andromeda galaxy. Hubble took this image so astronomers could study the stars’ ages and Andromeda’s merger history: https://bit.ly/3TVSIy9

spacetelescope, 14 days ago to random

Hundreds of thousands of stars are held together by their mutual gravitational attraction in globular cluster M80, one of the densest in our Milky Way galaxy. Older, bloated red giant stars stand out from the crowd, an example of our own sun’s future. Credit: Hubble, NASA/ESA

spacetelescope, 14 days ago to random

Scientists using #NASAWebb announced today that they have found the most distant known galaxy. It existed just 290 million years after the big bang, and its light traveled for 13.5 billion years to reach us: https://webbtelescope.org/contents/early-highlights/nasas-james-webb-space-telescope-finds-most-distant-known-galaxy

spacetelescope, 16 days ago to random

Galaxy M64—in this Hubble image—revealed a surprise: Gas in its outer regions is rotating in the opposite direction of the galaxy’s pinwheel arms. It’s likely the last evidence of a long-ago collision with a smaller galaxy that has been almost completely absorbed. Credit: NASA

spacetelescope, 16 days ago to random

Is “party galaxy” a technical term?

Not yet! NGC 4449 is many things—an irregular, dwarf, and starburst galaxy. It has likely “bobbed” and “twirled” with neighboring galaxies, and has enough gas to fuel another 1 billion years of star formation.

More: https://bit.ly/3vCSjsn

spacetelescope, 20 days ago to random

The region seen here in this Hubble image, R136, is a grouping of stars in the turbulent star-forming region, 30 Doradus. The Large Magellanic Cloud, which houses 30 Doradus, is a member of the Local Group, which also includes the Milky Way: https://bit.ly/4cIzFQy

spacetelescope, 20 days ago to random

Archival data from #NASAWebb shows a trio of distant galaxies that are in the process of gathering cold gas when the universe was only a few hundred million years old. (1/5) 🧵

spacetelescope, 20 days ago to random

The James Webb Space Telescope recently uncovered a trio of galaxies that were actively forming when the universe was only 400 to 600 million years old. Large parts of the galaxies are covered in gas, which will go on to cool, clump, and form new stars: https://webbtelescope.pub/4bb5K2l #NASAWebb

spacetelescope, 21 days ago to random

NASA's Summer #AstrophotoChallenge is open through August 5! Get ready to start processing your astro images of Cassiopeia A.

Want to learn more? Watch the video to find out!
https://mo-www.cfa.harvard.edu/OWN/astrophoto/index.html

video/mp4

spacetelescope, 22 days ago to random

During last year’s Roman Science Inspired by the "Emerging JWST Results" conference, a Science Writer’s Workshop sought to provide writers and journalists with strategies to explain the most important objectives for #NASARoman. (1/7) 🧵

spacetelescope, 23 days ago to random

What will happen when our sun dies? When it runs out of fuel in 5 billion years, it will expand into a red giant, engulfing the closest planets. It will then shrink to become a white dwarf, like the one highlighted in this Hubble image. How stars die: https://bit.ly/3VjcsOD

spacetelescope, 23 days ago to random

Why is the warm gas-giant exoplanet WASP-107 b so, so puffy? With a moderate temperature and an ultra-low density on par with a microwaved marshmallow, it seems to defy standard theories of planet formation and evolution. (1/7)

spacetelescope, 24 days ago to random

How did the warm gas-giant WASP-107 b get to be as big as Jupiter and as puffy as a microwaved marshmallow? Astronomers used #NASAWebb measurements of the planet’s atmosphere to crack the case: https://webbtelescope.pub/44M12FM

spacetelescope, 24 days ago to random

Fuzzy caterpillar? Nope! This Hubble image shows a runaway star plowing through a region of dense interstellar gas, creating brilliant structures and trails of glowing gas. The effect is known as a bow shock.

Why are the stars moving? Answer: https://bit.ly/3vDyhho

spacetelescope, 26 days ago to random

Every six weeks, a maneuver is planned for the James Webb Space Telescope to ensure it stays in its orbit a million miles away. It's carried out by a group of skilled engineers at the Space Telescope Science Institute.

Watch as the team prepares the observatory! #NASAWebb

https://youtu.be/F0CHvhlkmZg

spacetelescope, 27 days ago to random

The last facility at AURA we’ll be looking at is the Community Science and Data Center, home to the Astro Data Lab, the science platform with software for astronomy research. It enables the exploration and analysis of large datasets: https://datalab.noirlab.edu #AURAPartners

A horizontal image with a black background, showing a map projection of the sky. An oval shows shades of green, blue, yellow and red with a larger concentration of red points in the bottom half. A large swatch of gray is on the upper right of the oval. A red line appears across the oval, starting from the middle left, then dips down in a curve before going up in a curve and ending on the middle right of the oval.