Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 4
An artistic illustration of a black hole is shown. The black spot in
the center is the black hole, while the accretion disk of gas
surrounding it is shown in orange. Stars and the darkness of space is
shown near the top in the background. Please see the explanation for
more detailed information.

Spin up of a Supermassive Black Hole
Illustration Credit: Robert Hurt, NASA/JPL-Caltech

Explanation: How fast can a black hole spin? If any object made of
regular matter spins too fast -- it breaks apart. But a black hole
might not be able to break apart -- and its maximum spin rate is really
unknown. Theorists usually model rapidly rotating black holes with the
Kerr solution to Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, which
predicts several amazing and unusual things. Perhaps its most easily
testable prediction, though, is that matter entering a maximally
rotating black hole should be last seen orbiting at near the speed of
light, as seen from far away. This prediction was tested by NASA's
NuSTAR and ESA's XMM satellites by observing the supermassive black
hole at the center of spiral galaxy NGC 1365. The near light-speed
limit was confirmed by measuring the heating and spectral line
broadening of nuclear emissions at the inner edge of the surrounding
accretion disk. Pictured here is an artist's illustration depicting an
accretion disk of normal matter swirling around a black hole, with a
jet emanating from the top. Since matter randomly falling into the
black hole should not spin up a black hole this much, the NuSTAR and
XMM measurements also validate the existence of the surrounding
accretion disk.

Hole New Worlds: It's Black Hole Week at NASA!
Tomorrow's picture: planet lines
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 5
The featured image shows a night sky over some choppy water. The planet
Venus shines high in the night sky, while a faint Saturn in on the far
right. The crescent Moon is visible near the image center. A bright
boat beacon is also visible on the right. All of these objects are
reflected as lines in the foreground water. Please see the explanation
for more detailed information.

Planet Lines Across Water
Image Credit & Copyright: Jose Antonio Hervas

Explanation: WhatCÇÖs causing those lines? Objects in the sky sometimes
appear reflected as lines across water CÇö but why? If the waterCÇÖs
surface is smooth, then reflected objects would appear similarly -- as
spots. But if the water is choppy, then there are many places where
light from the object can reflect off the water and still come to you
-- and so together form, typically, a line. The same effect is
frequently seen for the Sun just before sunset and just after sunrise.
Pictured about 10 days ago in Ibiza, Spain, images of the setting Moon,
Venus (top), and Saturn (right, faint) were captured both directly and
in line-reflected forms from the Mediterranean Sea. The other bright
object on the right with a water-reflected line is a beacon on a rock
to warn passing boats.

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: open space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 7
Two large galaxies are shown against a dark starfield. The galaxy on
the upper left has blue spiral arms speckled with red nebulae. The
galaxy on the lower right has a white line with red filaments on each
side. Thin wisps cover some of the rest of the field. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

Galaxy Wars: M81 versus M82
Image Credit & Copyright: Collaborative Astrophotography Team (CAT)

Explanation: In the upper left corner, surrounded by blue arms and
dotted with red nebulas, is spiral galaxy M81. In the lower right
corner, marked by a light central line and surrounded by red glowing
gas, is irregular galaxy M82. This stunning vista shows these two
mammoth galaxies locked in gravitational combat, as they have been for
the past billion years. The gravity from each galaxy dramatically
affects the other during each hundred-million-year pass. Last go-round,
M82's gravity likely raised density waves rippling around M81,
resulting in the richness of M81's spiral arms. But M81 left M82 with
violent star forming regions and colliding gas clouds so energetic the
galaxy glows in X-rays. This big battle is seen from Earth through the
faint glow of an Integrated Flux Nebula, a little studied complex of
diffuse gas and dust clouds in our Milky Way Galaxy. In a few billion
years, only one galaxy will remain.

Tomorrow's picture: incredible crab 1
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 8
The Crab Nebula, M1, is shown as imaged by the James Webb Space
Telescope. The rollover image is the same Crab Nebula but this time
from the Hubble Space Telescope. The Webb image is in near infrared
light, while the Hubble image is in visible light. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

M1: The Incredible Expanding Crab
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI; Jeff Hester (ASU), Allison Loll
(ASU), Tea Temim (Princeton University)

Explanation: Cataloged as M1, the Crab Nebula is the first on Charles
Messier's famous list of things which are not comets. In fact, the Crab
Nebula is now known to be a supernova remnant, an expanding cloud of
debris from the death explosion of a massive star. The violent birth of
the Crab was witnessed by astronomers in the year 1054. Roughly 10
light-years across, the nebula is still expanding at a rate of about
1,500 kilometers per second. You can see the expansion by comparing
these sharp images from the Hubble Space Telescope and James Webb Space
Telescope. The Crab's dynamic, fragmented filaments were captured in
visible light by Hubble in 2005 and Webb in infrared light in 2023.
This cosmic crustacean lies about 6,500 light-years away in the
constellation Taurus.

Tomorrow's picture: interstellar particle beams
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 9
An artist's illustration of what the surroundings of the supermassive
black hole at the center of BL Lac is shown. A white jet protrudes
horizontally toward the bottom of the image, emanating from a orange
accretion disk surrounding a black hole. Please see the explanation for
more detailed information.

IXPE Explores a Black Hole Jet
Illustration Credit: NASA, Pablo Garcia

Explanation: How do black holes create X-rays? Answering this
long-standing question was significantly advanced recently with data
taken by NASACÇÖs IXPE satellite. X-rays cannot exit a black hole, but
they can be created in the energetic environment nearby, in particular
by a jet of particles moving outward. By observing X-ray light arriving
from near the supermassive black hole at the center of galaxy BL Lac,
called a blazar, it was discovered that these X-rays lacked significant
polarization, which is expected when created more by energetic
electrons than protons. In the featured artistic illustration, a
powerful jet is depicted emanating from an orange-colored accretion
disk circling the black hole. Understanding highly energetic processes
across the universe helps humanity to understand similar processes that
occur on or near our Earth.

Put it All Together: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: Yogi on Mars: 3D
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 10

Yogi and Friends in 3D
Image Credit: Mars Pathfinder Mission, JPL, NASA

Explanation: This picture from July 1997 shows a ramp from the
Pathfinder lander, the Sojourner robot rover, deflated landing airbags,
a couch, Barnacle Bill and Yogi Rock appear together in this 3D stereo
view of the surface of Mars. Barnacle Bill is the rock just left of the
house cat-sized, solar-paneled Sojourner. Yogi is the big
friendly-looking boulder at top right. The "couch" is the angular rock
shape visible near center on the horizon. Look at the image with
red/blue glasses (or just hold a piece of clear red plastic over your
left eye and blue or green over your right) to get the dramatic 3D
perspective. The stereo view was recorded by the remarkable Imager for
Mars Pathfinder (IMP) camera. The IMP had two optical paths for stereo
imaging and ranging and was equipped with an array of color filters for
spectral analysis. Operating as the first astronomical observatory on
Mars, the IMP also recorded images of the Sun and Deimos, the smallest
of Mars' two tiny moons.

Tomorrow's picture: if you could stand on Venus ...
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 11
A black & white image shows an empty flat landscape filled with
flattened rocks. At the bottom is part of the spacecraft that captured
this image of the planet Venus. Please see the explanation for more
detailed information.

The Surface of Venus from Venera 14
Image Credit: Soviet Planetary Exploration Program, Venera 14;
Processing & Copyright: Donald Mitchell & Michael Carroll (used with
permission)

Explanation: If you could stand on Venus -- what would you see?
Pictured is the view from Venera 14, a robotic Soviet lander which
parachuted and air-braked down through the thick Venusian atmosphere in
March of 1982. The desolate landscape it saw included flat rocks, vast
empty terrain, and a featureless sky above Phoebe Regio near Venus'
equator. On the lower left is the spacecraft's penetrometer used to
make scientific measurements, while the light piece on the right is
part of an ejected lens-cap. Enduring temperatures near 450 degrees
Celsius and pressures 75 times that on Earth, the hardened Venera
spacecraft lasted only about an hour. Although data from Venera 14 was
beamed across the inner Solar System over 40 years ago, digital
processing and merging of Venera's unusual images continues even today.
Recent analyses of infrared measurements taken by ESA's orbiting Venus
Express spacecraft indicate that active volcanoes may currently exist
on Venus.

Jigsaw Fun: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: Milky Way side view
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 12
A dark field of space surrounds a thin but colorful band horizontally
across the center. The band is nearly straight but curves at its outer
edges. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Gaia Reconstructs a Side View of our Galaxy
Illustration Credit: ESA, Gaia, DPAC, Stefan Payne-Wardenaar

Explanation: What does our Milky Way Galaxy look like from the side?
Because we are on the inside, humanity canCÇÖt get an actual picture.
Recently, however, just such a map has been made using location data
for over a billion stars from ESACÇÖs Gaia mission. The resulting
featured illustration shows that just like many other spiral galaxies,
our Milky Way has a very thin central disk. Our Sun and all the stars
we see at night are in this disk. Although hypothesized before, perhaps
more surprising is that the disk appears curved at the outer edges. The
colors of our Galaxy's warped central band derive mostly from dark
dust, bright blue stars, and red emission nebulas. Although data
analysis is ongoing, Gaia was deactivated in March after a successful
mission.

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: again from the top
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 13
A dark field surrounds a spiral galaxy with multiple arms. Please see
the explanation for more detailed information.

Gaia Reconstructs a Top View of our Galaxy
Illustration Credit: ESA, Gaia, DPAC, Stefan Payne-Wardenaar

Explanation: What does our Milky Way Galaxy look like from the top?
Because we are on the inside, humanity canCÇÖt get an actual picture.
Recently, however, just such a map has been made using location data
for over a billion stars from ESACÇÖs Gaia mission. The resulting
featured illustration shows that just like many other spiral galaxies,
our Milky Way has distinct spiral arms. Our Sun and most of the bright
stars we see at night are in just one arm: Orion. Gaia data bolsters
previous indications that our Milky Way has more than two spiral arms.
Our Galaxy's center sports a prominent bar. The colors of our Galaxy's
thin disk derive mostly from dark dust, bright blue stars, and red
emission nebula. Although data analysis is ongoing, Gaia was
deactivated in March after a succession mission.

Jigsaw Challenge: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: big space egg
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 14
A dark starfield highlights a blue and pink nebula in its center. Some
dark lanes of dust are seen inside nebula's center. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

NGC 1360: The Robin's Egg Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Andrea Iorio, Vikas Chander & ShaRA Team

Explanation: This pretty nebula lies some 1,500 light-years away, its
shape and color in this telescopic view reminiscent of a robin's egg.
The cosmic cloud spans about 3 light-years, nestled securely within the
boundaries of the southern constellation of the Furnace (Fornax).
Recognized as a planetary nebula, egg-shaped NGC 1360 doesn't represent
a beginning, though. Instead, it corresponds to a brief and final phase
in the evolution of an aging star. In fact, visible at the center of
the nebula, the central star of NGC 1360 is known to be a binary star
system likely consisting of two evolved white dwarf stars, less massive
but much hotter than the Sun. Their intense and otherwise invisible
ultraviolet radiation has stripped away electrons from the atoms in
their mutually surrounding gaseous shroud. The blue-green hue inside of
NGC 1360 seen here is the strong emission produced as electrons
recombine with doubly ionized oxygen atoms.

Celestial Surprise: What picture did APOD feature on your birthday?
(post 1995)
Tomorrow's picture: pluto below
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 15

A Plutonian Landscape
Image Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ./APL, Southwest Research
Institute

Explanation: This shadowy landscape of majestic mountains and icy
plains stretches toward the horizon on a small, distant world. It was
captured from a range of about 18,000 kilometers when New Horizons
looked back toward Pluto, 15 minutes after the spacecraft's closest
approach on July 14, 2015. The dramatic, low-angle, near-twilight scene
follows rugged mountains formally known as Norgay Montes from
foreground left, and Hillary Montes along the horizon, giving way to
smooth Sputnik Planum at right. Layers of Pluto's tenuous atmosphere
are also revealed in the backlit view. With a strangely familiar
appearance, the frigid terrain likely includes ices of nitrogen and
carbon monoxide with water-ice mountains rising up to 3,500 meters
(11,000 feet). That's comparable in height to the majestic mountains of
planet Earth. The Plutonian landscape is 380 kilometers (230 miles)
across.

Tomorrow's picture: pinwheel galaxy
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
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NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 16

Messier 101
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CFHT, NOAO;
Acknowledgement - K.Kuntz (GSFC), F.Bresolin (U.Hawaii), J.Trauger
(JPL), J.Mould (NOAO), Y.-H.Chu (U. Illinois)

Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy M101 is one of the last
entries in Charles Messier's famous catalog, but definitely not one of
the least. About 170,000 light-years across, this galaxy is enormous,
almost twice the size of our own Milky Way. M101 was also one of the
original spiral nebulae observed by Lord Rosse's large 19th century
telescope, the Leviathan of Parsontown. Assembled from 51 exposures
recorded by the Hubble Space Telescope in the 20th and 21st centuries,
with additional data from ground based telescopes, this mosaic spans
about 40,000 light-years across the central region of M101 in one of
the highest definition spiral galaxy portraits ever released from
Hubble. The sharp image shows stunning features of the galaxy's face-on
disk of stars and dust along with background galaxies, some visible
right through M101 itself. Also known as the Pinwheel Galaxy, M101 lies
within the boundaries of the northern constellation Ursa Major, about
25 million light-years away.

Tomorrow's picture: (The) Martian landscape
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 17

Ares 3 Landing Site: The Martian Revisited
Image Credit: HiRISE, MRO, LPL (U. Arizona), NASA

Explanation: This close-up from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter's
HiRISE camera shows weathered craters and windblown deposits in
southern Acidalia Planitia. A striking shade of blue in standard HiRISE
image colors, to the human eye the area would probably look grey or a
little reddish. But human eyes have not gazed across this terrain,
unless you count the eyes of NASA astronauts in the sci-fi novel, "The
Martian," by Andy Weir. The novel chronicles the adventures of Mark
Watney, an astronaut stranded at the fictional Mars mission Ares 3
landing site, corresponding to the coordinates of this cropped HiRISE
frame. For scale, Watney's 6-meter-diameter habitat at the site would
be about 1/10th the diameter of the large crater. Of course, the Ares 3
landing coordinates are only about 800 kilometers north of the (real
life) Carl Sagan Memorial Station, the 1997 Pathfinder landing site.

Tomorrow's picture: fly over pluto
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 18

Pluto Flyover from New Horizons
Video Credit: NASA, JHUAPL, SwRI, P. Schenk & J. Blackwell (LPI); Music
Open Sea Morning by Puddle of Infinity

Explanation: What if you could fly over Pluto -- what might you see?
The New Horizons spacecraft did just this in 2015 July as it shot past
the distant world at a speed of about 80,000 kilometers per hour.
Images from this spectacular passage have been color enhanced,
vertically scaled, and digitally combined into the featured two-minute
time-lapse video. As your journey begins, light dawns on mountains
thought to be composed of water ice but colored by frozen nitrogen.
Soon, to your right, you see a flat sea of mostly solid nitrogen that
has segmented into strange polygons that are thought to have bubbled up
from a comparatively warm interior. Craters and ice mountains are
common sights below. The video dims and ends over terrain dubbed bladed
because it shows 500-meter high ridges separated by kilometer-sized
gaps. The robotic New Horizons spacecraft has too much momentum to ever
return to Pluto and is now headed out of our Solar System.

Tomorrow's picture: moon Charon
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 19

Charon Flyover from New Horizons
Video Credit: NASA, JHUAPL, SwRI, P. Schenk & J. Blackwell (LPI);
Music: Juicy by ALBIS

Explanation: What if you could fly over Pluto's moon Charon -- what
might you see? The New Horizons spacecraft did just this in 2015 July
as it zipped past Pluto and Charon with cameras blazing. The images
recorded allowed for a digital reconstruction of much of Charon's
surface, further enabling the creation of fictitious flights over
Charon created from this data. One such fanciful, minute-long,
time-lapse video is shown here with vertical heights and colors of
surface features digitally enhanced. Your journey begins over a wide
chasm that divides different types of Charon's landscapes, a chasm that
might have formed when Charon froze through. You soon turn north and
fly over a colorful depression dubbed Mordor that, one hypothesis
holds, is an unusual remnant from an ancient impact. Your voyage
continues over an alien landscape rich with never-before-seen craters,
mountains, and crevices. The robotic New Horizons spacecraft has too
much momentum to ever return to Pluto and Charon and is now headed out
of our Solar System.

Portal Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: volcano sky
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 20
A wide starfield is shown with the dark and light band arching
horizontally across the middle. On the right is a colorful and complex
nebula, and near the top center is a red circular nebula. Please see
the explanation for more detailed information.

Milky Way over Maunakea
Image Credit & Copyright: Marzena Rogozinska

Explanation: Have you ever seen the band of our Milky Way Galaxy? In a
clear sky from a dark location at the right time, a faint band of light
becomes visible across the sky. Soon after your eyes become dark
adapted, you might spot the band for the first time. It may then become
obvious. Then spectacular. One reason for your growing astonishment
might be the realization that this fuzzy swath, the Milky Way, contains
billions of stars. Visible in the featured image, high above in the
night sky, the band of the Milky Way Galaxy arcs. Also visible are the
colorful clouds of Rho Ophiuchi on the right, and the red and circular
Zeta Ophiuchi nebula near the top center. Taken in late February from
Maunakea, Hawaii, USA, the foreground telescope is the University of
Hawaii's 2.2-Meter Telescope. Fortunately, you donCÇÖt need to be near
the top of a Hawaiian volcano to see the Milky Way.

Put it All Together: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: sun station
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 21
The Sun is pictured complete with active regions, filaments, and
prominences. Down the Sun's face is a series of silhouettes that are
the International Space Station passing right in front. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

International Space Station Crosses the Sun
Image Credit & Copyright: Pau Montplet Sanz

Explanation: Typically, the International Space Station is visible only
at night. Slowly drifting across the night sky as it orbits the Earth,
the International Space Station (ISS) can be seen as a bright spot
about once a month from many locations. The ISS is then visible only
just after sunset or just before sunrise because it shines by reflected
sunlight -- once the ISS enters the Earth's shadow, it will drop out of
sight. The only occasion when the ISS is visible during the day is when
it passes right in front of the Sun. Then, it passes so quickly that
only cameras taking short exposures can visually freeze the ISS's
silhouette onto the background Sun. The featured picture did exactly
that -- it is actually a series of images taken a month ago from Sant
Feliu de Buixalleu, Spain with perfect timing. This image series was
later combined with a separate image highlighting the texture of the
active Sun which included several Sun's prominences around the edge.

Celestial Surprise: What picture did APOD feature on your birthday?
(post 1995)
Tomorrow's picture: pluto below
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 22

Curly Spiral Galaxy M63
Image Credit & Copyright: Alberto Pisabarro

Explanation: A bright spiral galaxy of the northern sky, Messier 63 is
nearby, about 30 million light-years distant toward the loyal
constellation Canes Venatici. Also cataloged as NGC 5055, the majestic
island universe is nearly 100,000 light-years across, about the size of
our own Milky Way. Its bright core and majestic spiral arms lend the
galaxy its popular name, The Sunflower Galaxy. This exceptionally deep
exposure also follows faint loops and curling star streams far into the
galaxy's halo. Extending nearly 180,000 light-years from the galactic
center, the star streams are likely remnants of tidally disrupted
satellites of M63. Other satellite galaxies of M63 can be spotted in
the remarkable wide-field image, including dwarf galaxies, which could
contribute to M63's star streams in the next few billion years.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 23

NGC 6366 vs 47 Ophiuchi
Image Credit & Copyright: Massimo Di Fusco

Explanation: Most globular star clusters roam the halo of our Milky Way
galaxy, but globular cluster NGC 6366 lies close to the galactic plane.
About 12,000 light-years away toward the constellation Ophiuchus, the
cluster's starlight is dimmed and reddened by the Milky Way's
interstellar dust when viewed from planet Earth. As a result, the stars
of NGC 6366 look almost golden in this telescopic scene, especially
when seen next to relatively bright, bluish, and nearby star 47
Ophiuchi. Compared to the hundred thousand stars or so gravitationally
bound in distant NGC 6366, 47 Oph itself is a binary star system a mere
100 light-years away. Still, the co-orbiting stars of 47 Oph are too
close together to be individually distinguished in the image.

Tomorrow's picture: Deimos before sunrise
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 24

Deimos Before Sunrise
Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech

Explanation: Deimos takes 30 hours and 18 minutes to complete one orbit
around the Red Planet. That's a little more than one Martian day or sol
which is about 24 hours and 40 minutes long, so Deimos drifts westward
across the Martian sky. About 15 kilometers across at its widest, the
smallest of Mars' two moons is bright though. In fact Deimos is the
brightest celestial object in this Martian skyscape captured before
sunrise by Perseverance on March 1, the 1,433rd sol of the Mars rover's
mission. The image is a composed of 16 exposures recorded by one of the
rover's navigation cameras. The individual exposures were combined into
a single image for an enhanced low light view. Regulus and Algeiba,
bright stars in the constellation Leo, are also visible in the dark
Martian predawn sky.

Tomorrow's picture: beneath Jupiter
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 25
A close-up image is shown of the planet Jupiter. Many clouds are
visible including clouds colored blue near the bottom, on the left, and
white oval clouds on the upper right. Please see the explanation for
more detailed information.

Beneath Jupiter
Image Credit & Copyright: NASA, Juno, SwRI, MSSS; Processing & License:
Gerald Eichst+ñdt & Se+ín Doran

Explanation: Jupiter is stranger than we knew. NASA's Juno spacecraft
has now completed over 70 swoops past Jupiter as it moves around its
highly elliptical orbit. Pictured from 2017, Jupiter is seen from below
where, surprisingly, the horizontal bands that cover most of the planet
disappear into swirls and complex patterns. A line of white oval clouds
is visible nearer to the equator. Impressive results from Juno show
that Jupiter's weather phenomena can extend deep below its cloud tops,
that Jupiter's center has a core that is unexpectedly large and soft,
and that Jupiter's magnetic field varies greatly with location.
Although Juno is scheduled to keep orbiting Jupiter further into 2025,
at some time the robotic spacecraft will be maneuvered to plunge into
the giant planet.

Jigsaw Jumble: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: galaxy spikes
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 26
An oval galaxy is shown against a field of stars. The outer rings shows
many bright blue stars. In the center is a bright nucleus with eight
spikes jutting out. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

Spiral Galaxy NGC 2566 from Webb
Image Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Leroy

Explanation: WhatCÇÖs happening in the center of spiral galaxy NGC 2566?
First, the eight rays that appear to be coming out of the center in the
featured infrared image are not real CÇö they are diffraction spikes
caused by the mechanical structure of the Webb space telescope itself.
The center of NGC 2566 is bright but not considered unusual, which
means that it likely contains a supermassive black hole, although
currently not very active. At only 76 million light years away, the
light we see from NGC 2566 today left when dinosaurs roamed the Earth.
The picturesque galaxy is close enough so that Earthly telescopes,
including Webb and Hubble, can resolve the turbulent clouds of gas and
dust where stars can form and so allows study of stellar evolution. NGC
2566, similar in size to our Milky Way Galaxy, is notable for its
bright central bar and its prominent outer spiral arms.

Tomorrow's picture: colorful star clouds
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 27
A very colorful sky field is shown featuring many stars and nebulas
that appear red, yellow, blue, and brown. Please see the explanation
for more detailed information.

Zeta and Rho Ophiuchi with Milky Way
Image Credit & Copyright: Ireneusz Nowak

Explanation: Behold one of the most photogenic regions of the night
sky, captured impressively. Featured, the band of our Milky Way Galaxy
runs diagonally along the bottom-left corner, while the colorful Rho
Ophiuchi cloud complex is visible just right of center and the large
red circular Zeta Ophiuchi Nebula appears near the top. In general, red
emanates from nebulas glowing in the light of excited hydrogen gas,
while blue marks interstellar dust preferentially reflecting the light
of bright young stars. Thick dust usually appears dark brown. Many
iconic objects of the night sky appear, including (can you find them?)
the bright star Antares, the globular star cluster M4, and the Blue
Horsehead nebula. This wide field composite, taken over 17 hours, was
captured from South Africa last June.

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: powerful space jet
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 28

Herbig-Haro 24
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble Heritage (STScI / AURA) / Hubble-Europe
Collaboration
Acknowledgment: D. Padgett (GSFC), T. Megeath (University of Toledo),
B. Reipurth (University of Hawaii)

Explanation: This might look like a double-bladed lightsaber, but these
two cosmic jets actually beam outward from a newborn star in a galaxy
near you. Constructed from Hubble Space Telescope image data, the
stunning scene spans about half a light-year across Herbig-Haro 24 (HH
24), some 1,300 light-years or 400 parsecs away in the stellar
nurseries of the Orion B molecular cloud complex. Hidden from direct
view, HH 24's central protostar is surrounded by cold dust and gas
flattened into a rotating accretion disk. As material from the disk
falls toward the young stellar object, it heats up. Opposing jets are
blasted out along the system's rotation axis. Cutting through the
region's interstellar matter, the narrow, energetic jets produce a
series of glowing shock fronts along their path.

Tomorrow's picture: open space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 29

Irregular Dwarf Galaxy Sextans A
Image Credit & Copyright: Franz Hofmann, Gemsbock Observatory

Explanation: Grand spiral galaxies often seem to get all the attention,
flaunting young, bright, blue star clusters and pinkish star forming
regions along graceful, symmetric spiral arms. But small galaxies form
stars too, like irregular dwarf galaxy Sextans A. Its young star
clusters and star forming regions are gathered into a gumdrop-shaped
region a mere 5,000 light-years across. Seen toward the navigational
constellation Sextans, the small galaxy lies some 4.5 million
light-years distant. That puts it near the outskirts of the local group
of galaxies, that includes the large, massive spirals Andromeda and our
own Milky Way. Brighter Milky Way foreground stars appear spiky and
yellowish in this colorful telescopic view of Sextans A.

Tomorrow's picture: Mars in the loop
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 30

Mars in the Loop
Image Credit & Copyright: Tunc Tezel (TWAN)

Explanation: This composite of images spaced a weather-permitting 5 to
9 days apart, from 2024 September 19 (top right) through 2025 May 18
(bottom left), faithfully traces ruddy-colored Mars as it makes a
clockwise loop through the constellations Gemini and Cancer in planet
Earth's night sky. You can connect the dots and dates with your cursor
over the image, but be sure to check out this animation of the Red
Planet's 2024/25 retrograde motion. Of course Mars didn't actually
reverse the direction of its orbit. Instead, the apparent backwards
motion with respect to the background stars is a reflection of the
orbital motion of Earth itself. Retrograde motion can be seen each time
Earth overtakes and laps planets orbiting farther from the Sun, the
Earth moving more rapidly through its own relatively close-in orbit. In
this case Mars' apparent eastward motion began to reverse around
December 8, when it seemed to linger near open star cluster M44 in
Cancer. After wandering back to the west, under Gemini's bright stars
Castor and Pollux, Mars returned to pose near M44 by early May. At its
brightest near opposition on 2025 January 16, Mars was a mere 96
million kilometers away.

Tomorrow's picture: afterimage
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 May 31

Afterimage Sunset
Image Credit & Copyright: Marcella Giulia Pace

Explanation: On May 7, the Sun setting behind a church bell tower was
captured in this filtered and manipulated digital skyscape from Ragusa,
Sicily, planet Earth. In this version of the image the colors look
bizarre. Still, an intriguing optical illusion known as an afterimage
can help you experience the same scene with a more natural looking
appearance. To try it, find the sunspots of active region AR4079
grouped near the bottom of the blue solar disk. Relax and stare at the
dark sunspot group for about 30 seconds, then close your eyes or shift
your gaze to a plain white surface. In a moment an afterimage of the
sunset should faintly appear. But the afterimage sunset will have this
image's complementary colors and a more normal yellow Sun against a
familiar blue sky.

Tomorrow's picture: wildly interacting
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 2
The featured image shows a night sky with a large complex nebula in red
and blue. The Veil Nebula has several famous components such as the Bat
and Witch's Broom Nebulas. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

Veil Nebula: Wisps of an Ancient Supernova
Image Credit & Copyright: Abdullah Alharbi

Explanation: Wisps like this are all that remain visible of a Milky Way
star. About 7,000 years ago that star exploded in a supernova, leaving
the Veil Nebula. At the time, the expanding cloud was likely as bright
as a crescent Moon, remaining visible for weeks to people living at the
dawn of recorded history. Today, the resulting supernova remnant, also
known as the Cygnus Loop, has faded and is now visible only through a
small telescope directed toward the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus).
The remaining Veil Nebula is physically huge, however, and even though
it lies about 1,400 light-years distant, it covers over five times the
size of the full Moon. The featured picture was taken in Kuwait in
mid-2024 and features light emitted by hydrogen in red and oxygen in
blue. In deep images of the complete Veil Nebula like this, even
studious readers might not be able to identify the iconic filaments.

Piece it All Together: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: rainbow sky
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 3
A starfield is seen over water, clouds, and the lights of a city below.
The starfield is oddly not black, but shows a repeating assortment of
transparent colors diagonally from the lower left to the upper right.
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Rainbow Airglow over the Azores
Image Credit & Copyright: Miguel Claro (TWAN); Rollover Annotation:
Judy Schmidt

Explanation: Why would the sky glow like a giant repeating rainbow?
Airglow. Now, air glows all of the time, but it is usually hard to see.
A disturbance however -- like an approaching storm -- may cause
noticeable rippling in the Earth's atmosphere. These gravity waves are
oscillations in air analogous to those created when a rock is thrown in
calm water. The long-duration exposure nearly along the vertical walls
of airglow likely made the undulating structure particularly visible.
OK, but where do the colors originate? The deep red glow likely
originates from OH molecules about 87 kilometers high, excited by
ultraviolet light from the Sun. The orange and green airglow is likely
caused by sodium and oxygen atoms slightly higher up. The featured
image was captured during a climb up Mount Pico in the Azores of
Portugal. Ground lights originate from the island of Faial in the
Atlantic Ocean. A spectacular sky is visible through this banded
airglow, with the central band of our Milky Way Galaxy running up the
image center, and M31, the Andromeda Galaxy, visible near the top left.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Anchorage on June 11
Tomorrow's picture: Rubin begins
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 4
A large telescope appears on the left. The band of our Milky Way Galaxy
extends from the telescope to the upper right of the image. The horizon
has a slight glow. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

A Milky Road to the Rubin Observatory
Image Credit: NSF, DOE, Rubin Obs., Paulo Assun+º+úo Lago (Rubin Obs.)

Explanation: Is the sky the same every night? No -- the night sky
changes every night in many ways. To better explore how the night sky
changes, the USA's NSF and DOE commissioned the Vera C. Rubin
Observatory in Cerro Pach+|n, Chile. In final testing before routine
operations, Rubin will begin to explore these nightly changes -- slight
differences that can tell us much about our amazing universe and its
surprising zoo of objects. With a mirror over 8 meters across, Rubin
will continually reimage the entire visible sky every few nights to
discover new supernovas, potentially dangerous asteroids, faint comets,
and variable stars -- as well as mapping out the visible universe's
large-scale structure. Pictured, the distant central band of our Milky
Way Galaxy appears to flow out from the newly operational observatory.
Taken last month, the featured picture is a composite of 21 images
across the night sky, capturing airglow on the horizon and the Small
Magellanic Cloud galaxy on the lower left.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Anchorage on June 11
Tomorrow's picture: open space
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 5

Savudrija Star Trails
Image Credit & Copyright: Branko Nadj

Explanation: Savudrija lighthouse shines along the coast near the
northern end of the Istrian peninsula in this well-composed night
skyscape. A navigational aid for sailors on the Adriatic Sea, the
historic lighthouse was constructed in the early 19th century. But an
even older aid to navigation shines in the sky above, Polaris, alpha
star of the constellation Ursa Minor and also known as the North Star.
In this scene Polaris forms the shortest bright arc near the North
Celestial Pole, the extension of Earth's axis of rotation into space.
Of course, the North Celestial Pole lies exactly at the center of all
the concentric startrails. The composite image is a digital stack of
400 exposures, each 30 seconds long, taken with camera and tripod fixed
to a rotating planet.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 6

NGC 6302: The Butterfly Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Mike Selby

Explanation: The bright clusters and nebulae of planet Earth's night
sky are often given the names of flowers or insects, and its whopping 3
light-year wingspan, NGC 6302 is no exception. With an estimated
surface temperature of about 250,000 degrees C, the central star of the
planetary nebula is transforming into a white dwarf star, becoming
exceptionally hot, and shining brightly in ultraviolet light. The
central star is hidden from direct view by a torus of dust, but its
energetic ultraviolet light ionizes atoms in the nebula. In this sharp,
telescopic view composed with narrowband image data, the ionized
hydrogen and doubly ionized oxygen atoms are shown in their
characteristic red and blue-green hues to reveal a stunning complex of
knots and filaments within the nebula's wing-like bipolar outflows. NGC
6302 lies about 4,000 light-years away in the arachnologically correct
constellation of the Scorpion (Scorpius).

Tomorrow's picture: perseverance with ingenuity
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 7

Perseverance Selfie with Ingenuity
Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS

Explanation: On the Mars rover's mission Sol 46 or Earth date April 6,
2021, Perseverance held out a robotic arm to take its first selfie on
Mars. The WATSON camera at the end of the arm was designed to take
close-ups of Martian rocks and surface details though, and not a quick
snap shot of friends and smiling faces. In the end, teamwork and weeks
of planning on Mars time was required to program a complex series of
exposures and camera motions to include Perseverance and its
surroundings. The resulting 62 frames were composed into a detailed
mosaic, one of the most complicated Mars rover selfies ever taken. In
this version of the selfie, the rover's Mastcam-Z and SuperCam
instruments are looking toward WATSON and the end of the rover's
outstretched arm. About 4 meters (13 feet) from Perseverance is a
robotic companion, the Mars Ingenuity helicopter. Perseverance has now
spent over 1,500 sols exploring the surface of the Red Planet. On Earth
date January 18, 2024, Ingenuity made its 72nd and final flight through
the thin Martian atmosphere.

Tomorrow's picture: Facing NGC 3344
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 8
Grand spiral galaxy NGC 3344 is shown. Spiral arms with stars, star
clusters, and nebula are visible. Please see the explanation for more
detailed information.

Facing NGC 3344
Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

Explanation: From our vantage point in the Milky Way Galaxy, we see NGC
3344 face-on. Nearly 40,000 light-years across, the big, beautiful
spiral galaxy is located just 20 million light-years away in the
constellation of Leo Minor. This multi-color Hubble Space Telescope
close-up of NGC 3344 includes remarkable details from near infrared to
ultraviolet wavelengths. The frame extends some 15,000 light-years
across the spiral's central regions. From the core outward, the
galaxy's colors change from the yellowish light of old stars in the
center to young blue star clusters and reddish star forming regions
along the loose, fragmented spiral arms. Of course, the bright stars
with a spiky appearance are in front of NGC 3344 and lie well within
our own Milky Way.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Anchorage on Wednesday, June 11
at 7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: cosmic double
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 9
A starfield is shown with many stars and several faint light brown dust
clouds. In the center is a large cloud with brown dust and gas shells
lined in blue. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

Between Scylla and Charybdis: A Double Cosmic Discovery
Image Credit: M. Drechsler, Y. Sainty, A. Soto, N. Martino, L.
Leroux-Gere, S. Khallouqui, & A. Kaeouach; Text: Ogetay Kayali
(Michigan Tech U.)

Explanation: Can you identify this celestial object? Likely not CÇö
because this is a discovery image. Massive stars forge heavy elements
in their cores and, after a few million years, end their lives in
powerful supernova explosions. These remnants cool relatively quickly
and fade, making them difficult to detect. To uncover such faint,
previously unknown supernova remnants, a dedicated group of amateur
astrophotographers searched through sky surveys for possible supernova
remnant candidates. The result: the first-ever image of supernova
remnant G115.5+9.1 CÇö named Scylla by its discoverersCÇöglowing faintly in
the constellation of the mythological King of Aethiopia: Cepheus.
Emission from hydrogen atoms in the remnant is shown in red, and faint
emission from oxygen is shown in hues of blue. Surprisingly, another
discovery lurked to the upper right: a faint, previously unknown
planetary nebula candidate. In keeping with mythological tradition, it
was named Charybdis (Sai 2) CÇö a nod to the ancient Greek expression
"caught between Scylla and Charybdis" from HomerCÇÖs Odyssey.

Tomorrow's picture: leaky space orb
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 10
A picture of a mostly white orb is shown that has many craters and
crevasses. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Enceladus in True Color
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, JPL, SSI, Cassini Imaging Team

Explanation: Do oceans under the ice of Saturn's moon Enceladus contain
life? A reason to think so involves long features -- some dubbed tiger
stripes -- that are known to be spewing ice from the moon's icy
interior into space. These surface cracks create clouds of fine ice
particles over the moon's South Pole and create Saturn's mysterious
E-ring. Evidence for this has come from the robot Cassini spacecraft
that orbited Saturn from 2004 to 2017. Pictured here, a high resolution
image of Enceladus is shown in true color from a close flyby. The deep
crevasses are partly shadowed. Why Enceladus is active remains a
mystery, as the neighboring moon Mimas, approximately the same size,
appears quite dead. A analysis of ejected ice grains has yielded
evidence that complex organic molecules. These large carbon-rich
molecules bolster -- but do not prove -- that oceans under Enceladus'
surface could contain life.

APOD Turns 30!: Free public lecture in Anchorage tomorrow (Wednesday)
at 7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: top 25
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 11
A grid of images of the 25 brightest stars on the night sky is shown.
The grid is 5 x 5. Some stars look bluer or more orange than others
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

25 Brightest Stars in the Night Sky
Image Credit & Copyright: Tragoolchitr Jittasaiyapan

Explanation: Do you know the names of some of the brightest stars? It's
likely that you do, even though some bright stars have names so old
they date back to near the beginning of written language. Many world
cultures have their own names for the brightest stars, and it is
culturally and historically important to remember them. In the interest
of clear global communication, however, the International Astronomical
Union (IAU) has begun to designate standardized star names. Featured
here in true color are the 25 brightest stars in the night sky,
currently as seen by humans, coupled with their IAU-recognized names.
Some star names have interesting meanings, including Sirius ("the
scorcher" in Latin), Vega ("falling" in Arabic), and Antares ("rival to
Mars" in Greek). You are likely even familiar with the name of at least
one star too dim to make this list: Polaris.

APOD Turns 30!: Free public lecture in Anchorage TONIGHT (Wednesday) at
7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: open space
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 12

Solar Eclipse
Image Credit & Copyright: Fred Espenak

Explanation: On April 20, 2023 the shadow of a New Moon raced across
planet Earth's southern hemisphere. When viewed along a narrow path
that mostly avoided landfall, the Moon in silhouette created a hybrid
solar eclipse. Hybrid eclipses are rare and can be seen as a total
eclipse or an annular "ring of fire" eclipse depending on the
observer's position. Viewers of this much anticipated hybrid event were
able to witness a total solar eclipse while anchored in the Indian
Ocean near the centerline of the eclipse track off the coast of western
Australia. This ship-borne image from renowned eclipse chaser Fred
Espenak captured the active Sun's magnificent outer atmosphere, or
solar corona, streaming into space. The composite of 11 exposures
ranging from 1/2000 to 1/2 second, taken during the 62 seconds of
totality, records an extended range of brightness to follow alluring
details of the corona not quite visible to the eye.

Fred Espenak (1953-2025)
Tomorrow's picture: An Interesting Voyage
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 13

Rubin's Galaxy
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, B. Holwerda (University of Louisville)

Explanation: In this Hubble Space Telescope image the bright, spiky
stars lie in the foreground toward the heroic northern constellation
Perseus and well within our own Milky Way galaxy. In sharp focus beyond
is UGC 2885, a giant spiral galaxy about 232 million light-years
distant. Some 800,000 light-years across compared to the Milky Way's
diameter of 100,000 light-years or so, it has around 1 trillion stars.
That's about 10 times as many stars as the Milky Way. Part of an
investigation to understand how galaxies can grow to such enormous
sizes, UGC 2885 was also part of An Interesting Voyage and American
astronomer Vera Rubin's pioneering study of the rotation of spiral
galaxies. Her work was the first to convincingly demonstrate the
dominating presence of dark matter in our universe. A new U.S. coin has
been issured to honor Vera Rubin, while the Vera C. Rubin Observatory
is scheduled to unveil images from its first look at the cosmos on June
23.

Tomorrow's picture: criss-crossing
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 14
A night sky is shown with many stars and streaks. In the foreground at
the bottom are hills, a river, and the red and white streaks of car
lights. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Meteors and Satellite Trails over the Limay River
Image Credit & Copyright: Mart+¡n Molin+¬

Explanation: What are all those streaks in the sky? A galaxy, many
satellite trails, and a few meteors. First, far in the distance, the
majestic band of our Milky Way Galaxy runs down the left. Mirroring it
on the right are several parallel trails of Earth-orbiting Starlink
satellites. Many fainter satellite trails also crisscross the image.
The two short and bright streaks are meteors CÇö likely members of the
annual Eta Aquariids meteor shower. The planet Venus shines on the
lower right. Venus and the satellites shine by reflected sunlight. The
featured picture is a composite of exposures all taken in a few hours
on May 4 over the Limay River in Argentina.

Tomorrow's picture: One Sun
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

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* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 15
Two images are shown side by side. On the left is a sunset seen from
Earth, while on the right is a sunset seen from Mars. The Earth sunset
is quite orange, while the Mars sunset is quite blue. The Sun appears
angularly smaller from Mars than from the Earth. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

Two Worlds, One Sun
Left Image Credit & Copyright: Damia Bouic;
Right Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS; Digital processing: Damia
Bouic

Explanation: How different does sunset appear from Mars than from
Earth? For comparison, two images of our common star were taken at
sunset, one from Earth and one from Mars. These images were scaled to
have the same angular width and are featured here side-by-side. A quick
inspection will reveal that the Sun appears slightly smaller from Mars
than from Earth. This makes sense since Mars is 50% further from the
Sun than Earth. More striking, perhaps, is that the Martian sunset is
noticeably bluer near the Sun than the typically orange colors near the
setting Sun from Earth. The reason for the blue hues from Mars is not
fully understood, but thought to be related to forward scattering
properties of Martian dust. The terrestrial sunset was taken in 2012
March from Marseille, France, while the Martian sunset was captured in
2015 by NASA's robotic Curiosity rover from Gale crater on Mars.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Cork, Ireland on June 24
Tomorrow's picture: S30E1
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 16

APOD is 30 Years Old Today
Image Credit: Pixelization of Van Gogh's The Starry Night by Dario
Giannobile

Explanation: APOD is 30 years old today. In celebration, today's
picture uses past APODs as tiles arranged to create a single pixelated
image that might remind you of one of the most well-known and evocative
depictions of planet Earth's night sky. In fact, this Starry Night
consists of 1,836 individual images contributed to APOD over the last 5
years in a mosaic of 32,232 tiles. Today, APOD would like to offer a
sincere thank you to our contributors, volunteers, and readers. Over
the last 30 years your continuing efforts have allowed us to enjoy,
inspire, and share a discovery of the cosmos.

Tomorrow's picture: find the space rose
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 18
A detailed view of part of Earth's Moon is shown with many craters
visible. On the lower right, silhouetted against the comparatively
bright Moon, is a small dark silhouette of the International Space
Station. Many of the solar panels on the station are discernable.
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Space Station Silhouette on the Moon
Image Credit & Copyright: Eric Holland

Explanation: What's that unusual spot on the Moon? It's the
International Space Station. Using precise timing, the Earth-orbiting
space platform was photographed in front of a partially lit gibbous
Moon in 2019. The featured image was taken from Palo Alto, California,
USA with an exposure time of only 1/667 of a second. In contrast, the
duration of the transit of the ISS across the entire Moon was about
half a second. A close inspection of this unusually crisp ISS
silhouette will reveal the outlines of numerous solar panels and
trusses. The bright crater Tycho is visible on the lower left, as well
as comparatively rough, light colored terrain known as highlands and
relatively smooth, dark colored areas known as maria. Downloadable apps
can tell you when the International Space Station will be visible from
your area.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Cork, Ireland on June 24
Tomorrow's picture: galaxy in a bubble
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 17
A starfield is covered with a light red glow. Several nebulas are seen
near the center. The famous Rosette nebula appears in blue and white
near the image bottom. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

Rosette Nebula Deep Field
Image Credit: Toni Fabiani M+¬ndez

Explanation: Can you find the Rosette Nebula? The red flowery-looking
nebula just above the image center may seem a good choice, but that's
not it. The famous Rosette Nebula is really located on the lower right,
here colored blue and white, and connected to the other nebulas by
gold-colored filaments. Because the featured image of Rosette's field
is so wide, and because of its deep red exposure, it seems to contain
other flowers. Designated NGC 2237, the center of the Rosette Nebula is
populated by the bright blue stars of open cluster NGC 2244, whose
winds and energetic light are evacuating the nebula's center. The
Rosette Nebula is about 5,000 light years distant and, just by itself,
spans about three times the diameter of a full moon. This flowery field
can be found toward the constellation of the Unicorn (Monoceros).

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: not a crater
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 19

NGC 3521: Galaxy in a Bubble
Image Credit & Copyright: Vikas Chander

Explanation: Gorgeous spiral galaxy NGC 3521 is a mere 35 million
light-years away, toward the northern springtime constellation Leo.
Relatively bright in planet Earth's sky, NGC 3521 is easily visible in
small telescopes but often overlooked by amateur imagers in favor of
other Leo spiral galaxies, like M66 and M65. It's hard to overlook in
this colorful cosmic portrait though. Spanning some 50,000 light-years
the galaxy sports characteristic patchy, irregular spiral arms laced
with dust, pink star forming regions, and clusters of young, blue
stars. The deep image also finds NGC 3521 embedded in fainter,
gigantic, bubble-like shells. The shells are likely tidal debris,
streams of stars torn from satellite galaxies that have undergone
mergers with NGC 3521 in the distant past.

Tomorrow's picture: lunistice
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 20

Major Lunar Standstill 2024-2025
Image Credit & Copyright: Luca Vanzella, Alister Ling

Explanation: Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, planet Earth lies on the
horizon. in this stack of panoramic composite images. In a monthly time
series arranged vertically top to bottom the ambitious photographic
project follows the annual north-south swing of sunrise points, from
June solstice to December solstice and back again. It also follows the
corresponding, but definitely harder to track, Full Moon rise. Of
course, the north-south swing of moonrise runs opposite sunrise along
the horizon. But these rising Full Moons also span a wider range on the
horizon than the sunrises. That's because the well-planned project (as
shown in this video) covers the period June 2024 to June 2025, centered
on a major lunar standstill. Major lunar standstills represent extremes
in the north-south range of moonrise driven by the 18.6 year precession
period of the lunar orbit.

Tomorrow's picture: solstice
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 21

Two Worlds, Two Analemmas
Image Credit: (left) Copyright: Tunc Tezel (TWAN) - (right):
NASA/JPL/Cornell/ASU/TAMU

Explanation: Sure, that figure-8 shaped curve you get when you mark the
position of the Sun in Earth's sky at the same time each day over one
year is called an analemma. On the left, Earth's figure-8 analemma was
traced by combining wide-angle digital images recorded during the year
from December 2011 through December 2012. But the shape of an analemma
depends on the eccentricity of a planet's orbit and the tilt of its
axis of rotation, so analemma curves can look different for different
worlds. Take Mars for example. The Red Planet's axial tilt is similar
to Earth's, but its orbit around the same sun is more eccentric (less
circular) than Earth's orbit. As seen from the Martian surface, the
analemma traced in the right hand panel is shaped more like a tear
drop. The Mars rover Opportunity captured the images used over the
Martian year corresponding to Earth dates July 2006 to June 2008. Of
course, each world's solstice dates still lie at the top and bottom of
their different analemma curves. The last Mars northern summer solstice
was May 29, 2025. Our fair planet's 2025 northern summer solstice is at
June 21, 2:42 UTC.

Tomorrow's picture: just a bowl of spherules
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 22
The image looks down on an orange rock on Mars. On the rock are many
nearly spherical smaller rocks. Please see the explanation for more
detailed information.

A Berry Bowl of Martian Spherules
Image Credit: NASA, JPL, Curiosity Rover

Explanation: How were these unusual Martian spherules created?
Thousands of unusual gray spherules made of iron and rock and dubbed
blueberries were found embedded in and surrounding rocks near the
landing site of the robot Opportunity rover on Mars in 2004. To help
investigate their origin, Opportunity found a surface dubbed the Berry
Bowl with an indentation that was rich in the Martian orbs. The Berry
Bowl is pictured here, imaged during rover's 48th Martian day. The
average size of a Martian blueberry rock is only about 4 millimeters
across. By analyzing a circular patch in the rock surface to the left
of the densest patch of spherules, Opportunity obtained data showing
that the underlying rock has a much different composition than the
hematite rich blueberries. This information contributes to the growing
consensus that these small, strange, gray orbs were slowly deposited
from a bath of dirty water.

APOD Turns 30!: Free Public Lecture in Cork, Ireland on Tuesday, June
24 at 7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: heart stars
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 23
A star field is shown in infrared light. In the center is an extremely
complex nebula that is outlines an iconic heart. Glowing gas shades the
center of the heart red. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

W5: Pillars of Star Formation
Image Credit: NASA, WISE, IRSA; Processing & Copyright : Francesco
Antonucci

Explanation: How do stars form? Images of the star forming region W5
like those in the infrared by NASA's Wide Field Infrared Survey
Explorer (WISE, later NEOWISE) satellite provide clear clues with
indications that massive stars near the center of empty cavities are
older than stars near the edges. A likely reason for this is that the
older stars in the center are actually triggering the formation of the
younger edge stars. The triggered star formation occurs when hot
outflowing gas compresses cooler gas into knots dense enough to
gravitationally contract into stars. In the featured scientifically
colored infrared image, spectacular pillars left slowly evaporating
from the hot outflowing gas provide further visual clues. W5 is also
known as Westerhout 5 (W5) and IC 1848. Together with IC 1805, the
nebulas form a complex region of star formation popularly dubbed the
Heart and Soul Nebulas. The featured image highlights a part of W5
spanning about 2,000 light years that is rich in star forming pillars.
W5 lies about 6,500 light years away toward the constellation of
Cassiopeia.

APOD Turns 30!: Free public lecture in Cork, Ireland tomorrow (Tuesday)
at 7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: spiral spiral
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 24
A sprawling spiral galaxy is shown in great detail. This galaxy has
blue spiral arms and a bright center that itself seems to look like a
spiral galaxy. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

In the Center of Spiral Galaxy M61
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, ESO; Processing & Copyright: Robert
Gendler

Explanation: Is there a spiral galaxy in the center of this spiral
galaxy? Sort of. Image data from the Hubble Space Telescope, the
European Southern Observatory, and smaller telescopes on planet Earth
are combined in this detailed portrait of face-on spiral galaxy Messier
61 (M61) and its bright center. A mere 55 million light-years away in
the Virgo Cluster of Galaxies, M61 is also known as NGC 4303. It's
considered to be an example of a barred spiral galaxy similar to our
own Milky Way. Like other spiral galaxies, M61 also features sweeping
spiral arms, cosmic dust lanes, pinkish star forming regions, and young
blue star clusters. Its core houses an active supermassive black hole
surrounded by a bright nuclear spiral -- infalling star-forming gas
that itself looks like a separate spiral galaxy.

APOD Turns 30!: Free public lecture in Cork, Ireland TONIGHT (Tuesday)
at 7 pm
Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space and time
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 25

Rubin's First Look: A Sagittarius Skyscape
Image Credit & License: NSFCÇôDOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory

Explanation: This interstellar skyscape spans over 4 degrees across
crowded starfields toward the constellation Sagittarius and the central
Milky Way. A First Look image captured at the new NSFCÇôDOE Vera C. Rubin
Observatory, the bright nebulae and star clusters featured include
famous stops on telescopic tours of the cosmos: Messier 8 and Messier
20. An expansive star-forming region over a hundred light-years across,
Messier 8 is also known as the Lagoon Nebula. About 4,000 light-years
away the Lagoon Nebula harbors a remarkable cluster of young, massive
stars. Their intense radiation and stellar winds energize and agitate
this cosmic lagoon's turbulent depths. Messier 20's popular moniker is
the Trifid. Divided into three parts by dark interstellar dust lanes,
the Trifid Nebula's glowing hydrogen gas creates its dominant red
color. But contrasting blue hues in the colorful Trifid are due to dust
reflected starlight. The Rubin Observatory visited the Trifid-Lagoon
field to acquire all the image data during parts of four nights (May
1-4). At full resolution, Rubin's magnificent Sagittarius skyscape is
84,000 pixels wide and 51,500 pixels tall.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 26

The Seagull Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Timothy Martin

Explanation: An interstellar expanse of glowing gas and obscuring dust
presents a bird-like visage to astronomers from planet Earth,
suggesting its popular moniker, the Seagull Nebula. This broadband
portrait of the cosmic bird covers a 3.5-degree wide swath across the
plane of the Milky Way, in the direction of Sirius, alpha star of the
constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major). The bright head of the
Seagull Nebula is cataloged as IC 2177, a compact, dusty emission and
reflection nebula with embedded massive star HD 53367. The larger
emission region, encompassing objects with other catalog designations,
is Likely part of an extensive shell structure swept up by successive
supernova explosions. The notable bluish arc below and right of center
is a bow shock from runaway star FN Canis Majoris. Dominated by the
reddish glow of atomic hydrogen, this complex of interstellar gas and
dust clouds with other stars of the Canis Majoris OB1 association spans
over 200 light-years at the Seagull Nebula's estimated 3,800 light-year
distance.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 27

Messier 109
Image Credit & Copyright: Robert Eder

Explanation: Big beautiful barred spiral galaxy Messier 109 is the
109th entry in Charles Messier's famous catalog of bright Nebulae and
Star Clusters. You can find it just below the Big Dipper's bowl in the
northern constellation Ursa Major. In fact, bright dipper star Phecda,
Gamma Ursa Majoris, produces the glare at the upper right corner of
this telescopic frame. M109's prominent central bar gives the galaxy
the appearance of the Greek letter "theta", +., a common mathematical
symbol representing an angle. M109 spans a very small angle in planet
Earth's sky though, about 7 arcminutes or 0.12 degrees. But that small
angle corresponds to an enormous 120,000 light-year diameter at the
galaxy's estimated 60 million light-year distance. The brightest member
of the now recognized Ursa Major galaxy cluster, M109 (aka NGC 3992) is
joined by spiky foreground stars. Three small, fuzzy bluish galaxies
also on the scene, identified (top to bottom) as UGC 6969, UGC 6940 and
UGC 6923, are possibly satellite galaxies of the larger barred spiral
galaxy Messier 109.

Tomorrow's picture: light-weekend
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 28

Lunar Farside
Image Credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State Univ. / Lunar Reconnaissance
Orbiter

Explanation: Tidally locked in synchronous rotation, the Moon always
presents its familiar nearside to denizens of planet Earth. From lunar
orbit, the Moon's farside can become familiar, though. In fact this
sharp picture, a mosaic from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter's wide
angle camera, is centered on the lunar farside. Part of a global mosaic
of over 15,000 images acquired between November 2009 and February 2011,
the highest resolution version shows features at a scale of 100 meters
per pixel. Surprisingly, the rough and battered surface of the farside
looks very different from the nearside covered with smooth dark lunar
maria. A likely explanation is that the farside crust is thicker,
making it harder for molten material from the interior to flow to the
surface and form dark, smooth maria.

Tomorrow's picture: dark sand
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 29
Viewed from above, a landscape on Mars features many ridges of pink
sand. Superposed on some of these ridges are thin brown stipes. Please
see the explanation for more detailed information.

Dark Sand Cascades on Mars
Image Credit: NASA, HiRISE, MRO, LPL (U. Arizona),

Explanation: Are these trees growing on Mars? No. Groups of dark brown
streaks have been photographed by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on
melting pinkish sand dunes covered with light frost. The featured image
was taken in 2008 April near the North Pole of Mars. At that time, dark
sand on the interior of Martian sand dunes became more and more visible
as the spring Sun melted the lighter carbon dioxide ice. When occurring
near the top of a dune, dark sand may cascade down the dune leaving
dark surface streaks -- streaks that might appear at first to be trees
standing in front of the lighter regions but cast no shadows. Objects
about 25 centimeters across are resolved on this image spanning about
one kilometer. Close ups of some parts of this image show billowing
plumes indicating that the sand slides were occurring even while the
image was being taken.

Celestial Surprise: What picture did APOD feature on your birthday?
(post 1995)
Tomorrow's picture: raining stars
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 June 30
A spiral galaxy is shown with an unusual feature. Faint wisps of stars
are seen both above and below the galaxy. A wisp above appears like an
umbrella. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

NGC 4651: The Umbrella Galaxy
Image Credit: Rabeea Alkuwari & Anas Almajed

Explanation: It's raining stars. What appears to be a giant cosmic
umbrella is now known to be a tidal stream of stars stripped from a
small satellite galaxy. The main galaxy, spiral galaxy NGC 4651, is
about the size of our Milky Way, while its stellar parasol appears to
extend some 100 thousand light-years above this galaxy's bright disk. A
small galaxy was likely torn apart by repeated encounters as it swept
back and forth on eccentric orbits through NGC 4651. The remaining
stars will surely fall back and become part of a combined larger galaxy
over the next few million years. The featured deep image was captured
in long exposures from Saudi Arabia. The Umbrella Galaxy lies about 50
million light-years distant toward the well-groomed northern
constellation of Berenice's Hair (Coma Berenices).

APOD in a Modern Format StellarSnap
Tomorrow's picture: eye sky a dragon
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 1
A fisheye image of the sky is shown on the left with the
landscape-foreground surrounding it. The plane of our Milky Way Galaxy
runs down the center. At first glance the sky looks like oddly like an
eye of a dragon. Please see the explanation for more detailed
information.

Eye Sky a Dragon
Image Credit & Copyright: Anton Komlev

Explanation: What do you see when you look into this sky? In the
center, in the dark, do you see a night sky filled with stars? Do you
see a sunset to the left? Clouds all around? Do you see the central
band of our Milky Way Galaxy running down the middle? Do you see the
ruins of an abandoned outpost on a hill? (The outpost is on Askold
Island, Russia.) Do you see a photographer with a headlamp
contemplating surreal surroundings? (The featured image is a panorama
of 38 images taken last month and compiled into a Little Planet
projection.) Do you see a rugged path lined with steps? Or do you see
the eye of a dragon?

Tomorrow's picture: in spired
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 2
A skyscape is seen above an water inlet. Two rock spires rise from the
sea, and the central band of our Milky Way Galaxy is seen between them.
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Milky Way Through Otago Spires
Image Credit & Copyright: Kavan Chay; Text: Ogetay Kayali (Michigan
Tech U.)

Explanation: Does the Milky Way always rise between these two rocks?
No. Capturing this stunning alignment took careful planning: being in
the right place at the right time. In the featured image taken in June
2024 from Otago, New Zealand, the bright central core of our Milky Way
Galaxy, home to the many of our Galaxy's 400 billion stars, can be seen
between two picturesque rocks spires. For observers in Earth's Northern
Hemisphere, the core is only visible throughout the summer. As Earth
orbits the Sun, different parts of the Milky Way become visible at
different angles at different times of the night. As Earth rotates, the
orientation of the Milky Way in the sky also shifts -- sometimes
standing vertically as seen in the featured image, and other times
stretching parallel to the horizon, making it harder to see. In early
June, observers can watch it emerge low on the horizon after sunset and
gradually arc upward to reveal its full grandeur.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 3
A starfield is shown with constellations annotated. The band of our
Milky Way galaxy runs diagonally from the upper left to the lower
right. Just above the image center is a faint dot that is annotated in
yellow -- V462 LUPI, a nova that was visible with the unaided eye last
week and is currently still visible with binoculars. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

Nova V462 Lupi Now Visible
Image Credit & Copyright: Matipon Tangmatitham (NARIT)

Explanation: If you know where to look, you can see a thermonuclear
explosion from a white dwarf star. Possibly two. Such explosions are
known as novas and the detonations are currently faintly visible with
the unaided eye in Earth's southern hemisphere -- but are more easily
seen with binoculars. Pictured, Nova Lupi 2025 (V462 Lupi) was captured
toward the southern constellation of the Wolf (Lupus) last week near
the central plane of our Milky Way galaxy. Nova Lupi 2025 was
originally discovered on June 12 and peaked in brightness about a week
later. Similarly, Nova Velorum 2025, toward the southern constellation
of the Ship Sails (Vela), was discovered on June 25 and peaked a few
days later. A nova somewhere in our Galaxy becomes briefly visible to
the unaided eye only every year or two, so it is quite unusual to have
two novas visible simultaneously. Meanwhile, humanity awaits even a
different nova: T Coronae Borealis, which should become visible in
northern skies and is expected to become even brighter.

Tomorrow's picture: open space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 4

NGC 6946 and NGC 6939
Image Credit & Copyright: Alberto Pisabarro

Explanation: Face-on spiral galaxy NGC 6946 and open star cluster NGC
6939 share this cosmic snapshot, composed with over 68 hours of image
data captured with a small telescope on planet Earth. The field of view
spans spans about 1 degree or 2 full moons on the sky toward the
northern constellation Cepheus. Seen through faint interstellar dust
clouds near the plane of our Milky Way galaxy, the stars of open
cluster NGC 6939 are 5,600 light-years in the distance, near bottom
right in the frame. Face-on spiral galaxy NGC 6946 is at top left, but
lies some 22 million light-years away. In the last 100 years, 10
supernovae have been discovered in NGC 6946, the latest one seen in
2017. By comparison, the average rate of supernovae in our Milky Way is
about 1 every 100 years or so. Of course, NGC 6946 is also known as The
Fireworks Galaxy.

Tomorrow's picture: squid game
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 5

Ou4: The Giant Squid Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Massimo Di Fusco

Explanation: Difficult to capture, this mysterious, squid-shaped
interstellar cloud spans nearly three full moons in planet Earth's sky.
Discovered in 2011 by French astro-imager Nicolas Outters, the Squid
Nebula's bipolar shape is distinguished here by the telltale blue
emission from doubly ionized oxygen atoms. Though apparently surrounded
by the reddish hydrogen emission region Sh2-129, the true distance and
nature of the Squid Nebula have been difficult to determine. Still, one
investigation suggests Ou4 really does lie within Sh2-129 some 2,300
light-years away. Consistent with that scenario, the cosmic squid would
represent a spectacular outflow of material driven by a triple system
of hot, massive stars, cataloged as HR8119, seen near the center of the
nebula. If so, this truly giant squid nebula would physically be over
50 light-years across.

Tomorrow's picture: north pole of Mars
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 6
A computer construction of what the north pole of Mars looks like. The
picture was constructed from measured altitude data. A spiral landscape
is seen that is colored red but is mostly covered with white ice.
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

The Spiral North Pole of Mars
Image Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin; NASA MGS MOLA Science Team

Explanation: Why is there a spiral around the North Pole of Mars? Each
winter this pole develops a new outer layer about one meter thick
composed of carbon dioxide frozen out of the thin Martian atmosphere.
This fresh layer is deposited on a water-ice layer that exists year
round. Strong winds blow down from above the cap's center and swirl due
to the spin of the red planet -- contributing to Planum Boreum's spiral
structure. The featured image is a perspective mosaic generated in 2017
from numerous images taken by ESA's Mars Express and elevations
extracted from the laser altimeter aboard NASA's Mars Global Surveyor
mission.

Tomorrow's picture: alien comet
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 7
A drawing of our Solar System shows the orbits of Jupiter and interior
planets. A white line shows the trajectory of passing comet 3I/ATLAS.
Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS
Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech

Explanation: It came from outer space. An object from outside our Solar
System is now passing through at high speed. Classified as a comet
because of its gaseous coma, 3I/ATLAS is only the third identified
macroscopic object as being so alien. The comet's trajectory is shown
in white on the featured map, where the orbits of Jupiter, Mars, and
Earth are shown in gold, red, and blue. Currently Comet 3I/ATLAS is
about the distance of Jupiter from the Sun -- but closing, with its
closest approach to our Sun expected to be within the orbit of Mars in
late October. Expected to pass near both Mars and Jupiter, 3I/ATLAS is
not expected to pass close to the Earth. The origin of Comet 3I/ATLAS
remains unknown. Although initial activity indicates a relatively
normal comet, future observations about 3I/ATLAS' composition and
nature will surely continue.

Piece it All Together: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: stellar sisters
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 8
A cluster of bright blue stars is seen near the bottom of this
starfield. Nebula around the stars is blue near the stars but red
elsewhere. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

The Pleiades in Red and Blue
Image Credit & Copyright: Ogetay Kayali (Michigan Tech U.) Text: Ogetay
Kayali (Michigan Tech U.)

Explanation: If you have looked at the sky and seen a group of stars
about the size of the full Moon, that's the Pleiades (M45). Perhaps the
most famous star cluster in the sky, its brightest stars can be seen
even from the light-polluted cities. But your unaided eye can also see
its nebulosity -- the gas and dust surrounding it -- under dark skies.
However, telescopes can catch even more. The bright blue stars of the
Pleiades, also known as the Seven Sisters, light up their surrounding
dust, causing it to appear a diffuse blue that can only be seen under
long exposures. But that's not all. The cosmic dust appears to stretch
upward like ethereal arms. And the entire structure is surrounded by a
reddish glow from the most abundant element in the universe: hydrogen.
The featured image is composed of nearly 25 hours of exposure and was
captured last year from Starfront Observatory, in Texas, USA

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: open space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 9

A Beautiful Trifid
Image Credit & Copyright: Alessandro Cipolat Bares

Explanation: The beautiful Trifid Nebula is a cosmic study in
contrasts. Also known as M20, it lies about 5,000 light-years away
toward the nebula rich constellation Sagittarius. A star forming region
in the plane of our galaxy, the Trifid does illustrate three different
types of astronomical nebulae; red emission nebulae dominated by light
from hydrogen atoms, blue reflection nebulae produced by dust
reflecting starlight, and dark nebulae where dense dust clouds appear
in silhouette. But, the red emission region roughly separated into
three parts by obscuring dust lanes is what lends the Trifid its
popular name. Pillars and jets sculpted by newborn stars, above and
right of the emission nebula's center, appear in famous Hubble Space
Telescope close-up images of the region. The Trifid Nebula is about 40
light-years across. Too faint to be seen by the unaided eye, in this
deep telescopic view it almost covers the area of a full moon on planet
Earth's sky.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 10

Lynds Dark Nebula 1251
Image Credit & Copyright: Cristiano Gualco

Explanation: Stars are forming in Lynds Dark Nebula (LDN) 1251. About
1,000 light-years away and drifting above the plane of our Milky Way
galaxy, LDN 1251 is also less appetizingly known as "The Rotten Fish
Nebula." The dusty molecular cloud is part of a complex of dark nebulae
mapped toward the Cepheus flare region. Across the spectrum,
astronomical explorations of the obscuring interstellar clouds reveal
energetic shocks and outflows associated with newborn stars, including
the telltale reddish glow from scattered Herbig-Haro objects hiding in
the image. Distant background galaxies also lurk in the scene, almost
buried behind the dusty expanse. This alluring telescopic frame spans
almost three full moons on the sky. That corresponds to over 25
light-years at the estimated distance of LDN 1251.

Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 11

The Veins of Heaven
Image Credit & Copyright: P-M Hed+¬n (Clear Skies, TWAN)

Explanation: Transfusing sunlight as the sky grew darker, this
exceptional display of noctilucent clouds was captured on July 10,
reflected in the calm waters of Vallentuna Lake near Stockholm, Sweden.
From the edge of space, about 80 kilometers above Earth's surface, the
icy clouds themselves still reflect sunlight, even though the Sun is
below the horizon as seen from the ground. Usually spotted at high
latitudes in summer months, the night shining clouds have made a strong
showing so far during the short northern summer nights. Also known as
polar mesopheric clouds they are understood to form as water vapor
driven into the cold upper atmosphere condenses on the fine dust
particles supplied by disintegrating meteors or volcanic ash.

Tomorrow's picture: light-weekend
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 12

Clouds and the Golden Moon
Image Credit & Copyright: Alexsandro Mota

Explanation: As the Sun set, a bright Full Moon rose on July 10. Its
golden light illuminates clouds drifting through southern hemisphere
skies in this well-composed telephoto image from Concei+º+úo do Coit+¬,
Bahia, Brazil. The brightest lunar phase is captured here with both a
short and long exposure. The two exposures were combined to reveal
details of the lunar surface in bright moonlight and a subtle
iridescence along the dramatically backlit cloudscape. Of course,
July's Full Moon is a winter moon in the southern hemisphere. But in
the north it's known to some as the Thunder Moon, likely a nod to the
sounds of this northern summer month's typically stormy weather.

Tomorrow's picture: ants in space
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Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
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& Michigan Tech. U.

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

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fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 13
A dark starfield appears around an unusually shaped nebula. The nebula
has two main lobes on the left and the right and may seem to resemble
an ant. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.

Planetary Nebula Mz3: The Ant Nebula
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, R. Sahai (JPL) et al., Hubble Heritage Team

Explanation: Why isn't this ant a big sphere? Planetary nebula Mz3 is
being cast off by a star similar to our Sun that is, surely, round. Why
then would the gas that is streaming away create an ant-shaped nebula
that is distinctly not round? Clues might include the high
1000-kilometer per second speed of the expelled gas, the light-year
long length of the structure, and the magnetism of the star featured
here at the nebula's center. One possible answer is that Mz3 is hiding
a second, dimmer star that orbits close in to the bright star. A
competing hypothesis holds that the central star's own spin and
magnetic field are channeling the gas. Since the central star appears
to be so similar to our own Sun, astronomers hope that increased
understanding of the history of this giant space ant can provide useful
insight into the likely future of our own Sun and Earth.

Explore Your Universe: Random APOD Generator
Tomorrow's picture: twisted galaxy
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 14
An unusual galaxy is shown that appears lens-like in overall shape yet
has various rings of stars around the center. Please see the
explanation for more detailed information.

NGC 2685: The Helix Galaxy
Image Credit & Copyright: Stefan Thrun

Explanation: What is going on with this galaxy? NGC 2685 is a confirmed
polar ring galaxy - a rare type of galaxy with stars, gas and dust
orbiting in rings perpendicular to the plane of a flat galactic disk.
The bizarre configuration could be caused by the chance capture of
material from another galaxy by a disk galaxy, with the captured debris
strung out in a rotating ring. Still, observed properties of NGC 2685
suggest that the rotating helix structure is remarkably old and stable.
In this sharp view of the peculiar system also known as Arp 336 or the
Helix galaxy, the strange, perpendicular rings are easy to trace as
they pass in front of the galactic disk, along with other disturbed
outer structures. NGC 2685 is about 50,000 light-years across and 40
million light-years away in the constellation of the Great Bear (Ursa
Major).

Piece it All Together: Astronomy Puzzle of the Day
Tomorrow's picture: collapse on Mars
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 15
A view of the surface of Mars shows an unusual feature -- a seemingly
square crater bounded on three sides. Please see the explanation for
more detailed information.

Collapse in Hebes Chasma on Mars
Image Credit & License: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum)

Explanation: What's happened in Hebes Chasma on Mars? Hebes Chasma is a
depression just north of the enormous Valles Marineris canyon. Since
the depression is unconnected to other surface features, it is unclear
where the internal material went. Inside Hebes Chasma is Hebes Mensa, a
5 kilometer high mesa that appears to have undergone an unusual partial
collapse -- a collapse that might be providing clues. The featured
image, taken by ESA's robotic Mars Express spacecraft currently
orbiting Mars, shows great details of the chasm and the unusual
horseshoe shaped indentation in the central mesa. Material from the
mesa appears to have flowed onto the floor of the chasm, while a
possible dark layer appears to have pooled like ink on a downslope
landing. One hypothesis holds that salty rock composes some lower
layers in Hebes Chasma, with the salt dissolving in melted ice flows
that drained through holes into an underground aquifer.

Tomorrow's picture: unicorn space rose
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
written by a professional astronomer.

2025 July 16
A deep image of the Rosette Nebula is shown along with a field of
stars. As many color filters were used, the flowery nebula takes on
many colors with blue in the center, yellow and orange around the blue,
and red around the outside. Please see the explanation for more
detailed information.

The Rosette Nebula from DECam
Image Credit: CTIO, NOIRLab, DOE, NSF, AURA; Processing: T. A. Rector
(U. Alaska Anchorage), D. de Martin (NSFCÇÖs NOIRLab) & M. Zamani

Explanation: Would the Rosette Nebula by any other name look as sweet?
The bland New General Catalog designation of NGC 2237 doesn't appear to
diminish the appearance of this flowery emission nebula, as captured by
the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) on the Blanco 4-meter telescope at the
NSF's Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. Inside the
nebula lies an open cluster of bright young stars designated NGC 2244.
These stars formed about four million years ago from the nebular
material and their stellar winds are clearing a hole in the nebula's
center, insulated by a layer of dust and hot gas. Ultraviolet light
from the hot cluster stars causes the surrounding nebula to glow. The
Rosette Nebula spans about 100 light-years across, lies about 5000
light-years away, and can be seen with a small telescope towards the
constellation of the Unicorn (Monoceros).

Open Science: Browse 3,700+ codes in the Astrophysics Source Code
Library
Tomorrow's picture: 3I
__________________________________________________________________

Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy, Accessibility, Notices;
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.

--- BBBS/Li6 v4.10 Toy-7
* Origin: The Rusty MailBox - Penticton, BC Canada (1:153/757)