Yesterday, the winners of the fifth annual Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition were finally announced—and man oh man, are they stunning. Over 1,200 amateurs and pros submitted shots, ranging from stunning aurora borealis images to a panorama taken by a ten-year-old whiz kid.
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Saturn’s never looked more majestic than in this beautiful high-resolution image captured recently by Cassini.
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This story proves that sometimes even really smart people get things horribly wrong. For the last 30 years, astronomers have believed that a massive object known as Don Quixote was a near-Earth asteroid. In fact, the object was classified as the third largest near-Earth asteroid. The problem is scientists have recently realized it’s not an asteroid at all. Don Quixote is actually a comet.
The orbit of the comet skirts the Earth and goes all the way close to the orbit of Jupiter. Some believed that Don Quixote was a dead comet, but recently the scientists realized that it has a faint coma and tail. This comet activity has gone undetected for 30 years.
Scientist David Trilling from Northern Arizona University says that Don Quixote is “sopping wet” with large deposits of carbon dioxide and water ice. The comet measures about 11 miles long. Some scientists believe that comets rich in water ice such as Don Quixote could possibly be the source of water here on earth.
[via ASDNews]
Astronomers have recently discovered a new star that is described as the oldest twin to our sun ever discovered. The newly discovered star offers a glimpse at what our Sun will look like four billion years in the future. The newly discovered star is called HIP 102152. Astronomers say that the newly discovered star is […]
Now this is fun. Kurzgesagt made a fantastic animation video detailing our solar system. Perfect for anyone who’s space curious (and that should be everyone), perfect to sit down and show your kid, perfect to learn everything about astronomy that you probably forgotten by now. It’s like taking a trip through a beautiful minimalist solar system to understand the universe around us. [Kurzgesagt]
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An international team of astronomers are having a blast with a new type of camera that can take photos of space that are twice as sharp as those taken by the Hubble Telescope. The technology’s been in the works for over 20 years, and when you see the pictures you can see why they were worth the wait.
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Collisions happen on different scales. Particles collide. Squirrels accidentally run into each other. Rams butt heads. Tectonic plates shift against each other. There’s a lot going on. But in this photo a dwarf galaxy and spiral galaxy are smooshing into each other. And galaxies are kind of huge.
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Look there were a lot of options. NASA streamed
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No matter how wry your sense of humor or how pessimistic your outlook, you have to give into your human capacity for awe at some point. And it might as well be now because this photo is amazing. The spiral galaxy, M74, consists of about 100 billion stars and is 32 million light-years away if you’re headed toward Pisces. And I think I can speak for everyone when I say that we wish we were.
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This moon looks even more like it’s made from green cheese than ours does, but it’s not. Lame. Io, the innermost moon of Jupiter, is the most volcanically active body in our solar system because of gravitational "tides" exerted by Jupiter and its other moons. And the constantly flowing lava gives Io’s surface frequent makeovers.
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