These two mighty galaxies are pulling each other apart. Known as the “Mice” because they have such long tails, each spiral galaxy has likely already passed through the other. The long tails are created by the relative difference between gravitational pulls on the near and far parts of each galaxy. Because the distances are so large, the cosmic interaction takes place in slow motion – over hundreds of millions of years. NGC 4676 lies about 300 million light-years away toward the constellation of Bernice’s Hair (Coma Berenices) and are likely members of the Coma Cluster of Galaxies. The above picturewas taken with the Hubble Space Telescope’s Advanced Camera for Surveys in 2002. These galactic mice will probably collide again and again over the next billion years until they coalesce to form a single galaxy.
The Space Shuttle Discovery, the shuttle that launched the Famed Hubble Telescope into space, and flew 39 missions to space. The shuttle is so much larger than I thought it was. What an incredible piece of engineering and technology.
Credits: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration. Acknowledgment: R. O’Connell (University of Virginia) and the WFC3 Scientific Oversight Committee
Spectacular image of the spiral galaxy NGC 7331 captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. It’s located around 45 million light-years from Earth, residing in the constellation Pegasus.
I don’t know about you, but this is one of the sexiest pictures of a galaxy I’ve ever seen. This galaxy knows it’s fine af—showing off its lovely and colorful swirling arms. Fuck me.
This picture is the parallel field for the galaxy cluster Abell 370. Assembled using multiple images captured by the Hubble Telescope, the light arced trails are from over 20 distinct asteroids moving along their orbits.
EXCITING NEWS: we sponsored the American Astronomical Society team uniforms at AAS235*! The designs feature the phases of the moon and the Hubble Space Telescope…both with POCKETS.
We are so thrilled to see them in the wild!
- Summer & Emily
*We are dividing and conquering our annual American Astronomical Society winter meeting this year with Emily in situ in Honolulu and Summer holding down the social media fort in New Mexico.
Stormy seas in Sagittarius by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Via Flickr: Some of the most breathtaking views in the Universe are created by nebulae — hot, glowing clouds of gas. This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the centre of the Lagoon Nebula, an object with a deceptively tranquil name. The region is filled with intense winds from hot stars, churning funnels of gas, and energetic star formation, all embedded within an intricate haze of gas and pitch-dark dust.
LOL yep that’s the day job! I started last year after graduating, working on the NASA side of things with the mission doing social media/outreach, so I’m going to do my obligatory HUBBY LINK DROP: insta,twitter,fb
The center of the Lagoon Nebula is a whirlwind of spectacular star formation. Visible near the image center, at least two long funnel-shaped clouds, each roughly half a light-year long, have been formed by extreme stellar winds and intense energetic starlight. A tremendously bright nearby star, Hershel 36, lights the area. Vast walls of dust hide and redden other hot young stars. As energy from these stars pours into the cool dust and gas, large temperature differences in adjoining regions can be created generating shearing winds which may cause the funnels. This picture, spanning about 15 light years, features two colors detected by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. The Lagoon Nebula, also known as >M8, lies about 5000 light years distant toward the constellation of the Archer Sagittarius.
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble; Processing & Copyright: Diego Gravinese
Newly discovered Comet SWAN has already developed an impressive tail. The comet came in from the outer Solar System and has just passed inside the orbit of the Earth. Officially designated C/2020 F8 (SWAN), this outgassing interplanetary iceberg will pass its closest to the Earth on May 13, and closest to the Sun on May 27. The comet was first noticed in late March by an astronomy enthusiast looking through images taken by NASA’s Sun-orbiting SOHO spacecraft, and is named for this spacecraft's Solar Wind Anisotropies (SWAN) camera. The featured image, taken from the dark skies in Namibia in mid-April, captured Comet SWAN's green-glowing coma and unexpectedly long, detailed, and blue ion-tail. Although the brightness of comets are notoriously hard to predict, some models have Comet SWAN becoming bright enough to see with the unaided eye during June.
Human eyes can see only a small portion of the range of radiation given off by the objects around us. We call this wide array of radiation the electromagnetic spectrum, and the part we can see visible light.
In this Hubble Space Telescope image, researchers revisited one of Hubble's most iconic and popular images: the Eagle Nebula’s Pillars of Creation.
Here, the pillars are seen in infrared light, which pierces through obscuring dust and gas and unveil a more unfamiliar - but just as amazing - view of the pillars. The better-known image is of the pillars in visible light.
In this ethereal view the entire frame is peppered with bright stars and baby stars are revealed being formed within the pillars themselves. The ghostly outlines of the pillars seem much more delicate, and are silhouetted against an eerie blue haze.
Explore how light affects the images we see. Find more online activities on Hubble Inspires.
Image Credit: NASA, ESA/Hubble and the Hubble Heritage Team
What’s happening in the center of nearby spiral galaxy M77? The face-on galaxy lies a mere 47 million light-years away toward the constellation of the Sea Monster (Cetus). At that estimated distance, this gorgeous island universe is about 100 thousand light-years across. Also known as NGC 1068, its compact and very bright core is well studied by astronomers exploring the mysteries of supermassive black holes in active Seyfert galaxies. M77 and its active core glows bright at x-ray, ultraviolet, visible, infrared, and radio wavelengths. The featured sharp image of M77 was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and is dominated by the (visible) red light emitted by hydrogen. The image shows details of the spiral's winding spiral arms as traced by obscuring dust clouds, and red-tinted star forming regions close in to the galaxy’s luminous core.
Why does this galaxy spin so fast? To start, even identifying which type of galaxy UGC 12591 is difficult – featured on the lower left, it has dark dust lanes like a spiral galaxy but a large diffuse bulge of stars like a lenticular. Surprisingly observations show that UGC 12591 spins at about 480 km/sec, almost twice as fast as our Milky Way, and the fastest rotation rate yet measured. The mass needed to hold together a galaxy spinning this fast is several times the mass of our Milky Way Galaxy. Progenitor scenarios for UGC 12591 include slow growth by accreting ambient matter, or rapid growth through a recent galaxy collision or collisions – future observations may tell. The light we see today from UGC 12591 left about 400 million years ago, when trees were first developing on Earth.
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble; Processing & Copyright: Leo Shatz
What’s all of the commotion in the Tadpole Nebula? Star formation. Dusty emission in the Tadpole Nebula, IC 410, lies about 12,000 light-years away in the northern constellation of the Charioteer (Auriga). The cloud of glowing gas is over 100 light-years across, sculpted by stellar winds and radiation from embedded open star cluster NGC 1893. Formed in the interstellar cloud a mere 4 million years ago, bright newly formed cluster stars are seen all around the star-forming nebula. Notable near the image center are two relatively dense streamers of material trailing away from the nebula’s central regions. Potentially sites of ongoing star formation in IC 410, these cosmic tadpole shapes are about 10 light-years long. The featured image was taken in infrared light by NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) satellite.
Image Credit: WISE, IRSA, NASA; Processing & Copyright: Francesco Antonucci
Once upon a time, scientists decided, “what would happen if we point Hubble at this dark piece of the sky and leave the exposure open for an absurd amount of time?” Said scientists then experienced sudden bowel incontinence from the results. Vast specks of light, like the first image and when zoomed in, each individual speck of light is it’s own galaxy with it’s own solar systems.
Seeing the sheer vastness of the universe and that it’s so large, it’s incomprehensible to our feeble minds, is it possible that we’re alone? Where are all the aliens?
The Fermi Paradox tries to describe why we seem to be alone in a vast sea of endless possibilities for intelligent life to form. Life seems to form easily, surely it’s the same elsewhere.
Here’s some main bullet point arguments as to why we’re seemingly alone.
• We’re too far apart, separated by vast space and time • We’re rare or we’re the first • The aliens don’t have advanced technology (we don’t either). Think of it this way, an octopus or a crow is intelligent life. They’ve never even visited the moon. • Mass extinctions happen more often than not, they might be dead or intelligent life never exists long enough to make contact with each other before it’s wiped out • We haven’t existed long enough to be discovered or to figure out how to find others • They’re too advanced for us • It’s simple nature of intelligent life to eventually wipe itself out • Intelligent life has discovered that it’s too dangers to be in contact • We’re not listening properly for their messages. It’s like trying to listen to a CD on a record player - it won’t work. • We’re not contacted because we’re in a simulation or an alien zoo • Maybe they’re already here, observing • Maybe they’re here (e.g. UFOs?) we just don’t know how to talk to them or acknoweldge them. We laugh at most UFO reports.
