Topic: Celestial Antiquity

  • February 7, 2026
    Massive stars in our Milky Way Galaxy live spectacular lives. Collapsing from vast cosmic clouds, their nuclear furnaces ignite and…
  • February 6, 2026
    Most galaxies don't have any rings -- why does this galaxy have three? To begin, a ring that's near NGC…
  • February 5, 2026
    Active galaxy NGC 1275 is the central, dominant member of the large and relatively nearby Perseus Cluster of Galaxies. Wild-looking…
  • February 4, 2026
    NGC 2996 is a lenticular galaxy in the Hydra constellation, located approximately 250 million light-years away. It is characterized by…
  • February 3, 2026
    The Red Spider Planetary Nebula shows the complex structure that can result when a normal star ejects its outer gases…
  • February 2, 2026
    Just north of the famous Orion Nebula is a picturesque star forming region in Orion's Sword that contains a lot…
  • February 1, 2026
    Messier 63 or M63, also known as NGC 5055 or the seldom-used Sunflower Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy in the…
  • January 31, 2026
    Distorted galaxy NGC 2442 can be found in the southern constellation of the flying fish, (Piscis) Volans. Located about 50…
  • January 30, 2026
    NGC 1333 is seen in visible light as a reflection nebula, dominated by bluish hues characteristic of starlight reflected by…
  • January 29, 2026
    In the vast Orion Molecular Cloud complex, several bright blue nebulas are particularly apparent. Pictured here in the center are…
  • January 28, 2026
    Today’s Picture of the Week represents an unexpected full circle moment. The depicted object, known as Ve 7–27 (RX J0852.0-4622…
  • January 27, 2026
    This NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope Picture of the Month brings us a scene from the distant Universe. Pictured here…
  • January 26, 2026
    This image was obtained with the wide-field view of the Mosaic camera on the Mayall 4-meter telescope at Kitt Peak…
  • January 25, 2026
    This fascinating field of view contrasts the glowing emission nebula Sh2-204 with the dark nebulae LDN 1388 and LDN 1389,…
  • January 24, 2026
    NGC 4725 is an intermediate barred spiral galaxy with a prominent ring structure, located in the northern constellation of Coma…
  • January 23, 2026
    Very faint planetary nebula Abell 7 is about 1,800 light-years distant. It lies just south of Orion in planet Earth's…
  • January 22, 2026
    The silhouette of an intriguing dark nebula inhabits this cosmic scene. Lynds' Dark Nebula (LDN) 1622 appears against a faint…
  • January 21, 2026
    A mere 56 million light-years distant toward the southern constellation Fornax, NGC 1365 is an enormous barred spiral galaxy about…
  • January 20, 2026
    Not all rings are forged in fantasy, my precious! For astronomers, they are found in space. The ones in today’s…
  • January 19, 2026
    CTB 1 is the expanding gas shell that was left when a massive star toward the constellation of Cassiopeia exploded…
  • January 18, 2026
    The Antlia Cluster (or Abell S0636) is a cluster of galaxies located in the Hydra–Centaurus Supercluster. The Antlia Cluster is…
  • January 17, 2026
    NGC 1365, also known as the Fornax Propeller Galaxy or the Great Barred Spiral Galaxy, is a double-barred spiral galaxy…
  • January 16, 2026
    These cosmic clouds have blossomed 1,300 light-years away in the fertile starfields of the constellation Cepheus. Called the Iris Nebula,…
  • January 15, 2026
    The Pleiades also known as Seven Sistersand Messier 45 (M45), is an asterism of an open star cluster containing young…
  • January 14, 2026
    The Whirlpool Galaxy is a classic spiral galaxy. At only 30 million light years distant and fully 60 thousand light…
  • January 13, 2026
    WE2-37 (or Vyssotsky 2-2) is a faint, mysterious, and relatively young proto-planetary nebula located near the Seagull Nebula complex in…
  • January 12, 2026
    These galaxies look to be close companions — a small, bright spiral galaxy flitting around the edge of a much…
  • January 11, 2026
    This floating ring is the size of a galaxy. In fact, it is a galaxy -- or at least part…
  • January 10, 2026
    IC 5146 (also Caldwell 19, Sh 2-125, Barnard 168, and the Cocoon Nebula) is a reflection/emission nebula and Caldwell object…
  • January 9, 2026
    NGC 1512 is a barred spiral galaxy approximately 38 million light-years away from Earth in the constellation Horologium. It was…
  • January 8, 2026
    Similar in size to large, bright spiral galaxies in our neighborhood, IC 342 is a mere 10 million light-years distant…
  • January 7, 2026
    The Spaghetti Nebula. Officially cataloged as Simeis 147 and Sharpless 2-240, it is easy to get lost following the looping…
  • January 6, 2026
    Today’s ESA/Hubble Picture of the Week highlights another view of a distant stellar birthplace. Captured in a parallel field to…
  • January 5, 2026
    The object referred to as GAL316 is a dense molecular gas cloud where stars are forming, located at an approximate…
  • January 4, 2026
    NGC 346 is a young open cluster of stars with associated nebula located in the Small Magellanic Cloud(SMC) that appears…
  • January 3, 2026
    LEDA 1313424 (also known as the Bullseye Galaxy) is a collisional ring galaxy (CRG) located in the Pisces constellation around…
  • January 2, 2026
    NGC 4565 (also known as the Needle Galaxy or Caldwell 38) is an edge-on spiral galaxy about 30 to 50…
  • January 1, 2026
    Cycle 25 solar maximum made 2025 a great year for aurora borealis (or aurora australis) on planet Earth. And the…
  • December 31, 2025
    The structure, officially designated Herbig-Haro 222, appears in the region of NGC 1999 in the Great Orion Molecular Cloud complex.…
  • December 30, 2025
    Messier 43 or M43, also known as De Mairan's Nebula and NGC 1982, is a star-forming nebulawith a prominent H…
  • December 28, 2025
    Jewels don't shine this bright -- only stars do. And almost every spot in this jewel-box of an image from…
  • December 27, 2025
    The Triangulum Galaxy is a spiral galaxy 2.878 million light-years (ly) from Earth in the constellationTriangulum. It is catalogued as Messier…
  • December 26, 2025
    Attention grabbing interstellar visitor 3I/ATLAS made its not-so-close flyby of our fair planet on December 19 at a distance of…
  • December 25, 2025
    A star forming region cataloged as NGC 2264, this beautiful but complex arrangement of interstellar gas and dust is about…
  • December 24, 2025
    NGC 2264 is the designation number of the New General Catalogue that identifies two astronomical objects as a single object:…
  • December 23, 2025
    Abell 85, also known as CTB1, is a faint supernova remnant in Cassiopeia at a distance of approximately 9,780 light-years.…
  • December 22, 2025
    A sideways spiral galaxy shines in today’s ESA/Hubble Picture of the Week. Located about 60 million light-years away in the…
  • December 21, 2025
    IC 342 (also known as Caldwell 5) is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the constellationCamelopardalis, located relatively close to the…
  • December 20, 2025
    NGC 300 (also known as Caldwell 70 or the Sculptor Pinwheel Galaxy) is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Sculptor.…
  • December 19, 2025
    The final ESA/Webb Picture of the Month feature for 2025 showcases a festive-looking region filled with glowing clouds of gas…
  • December 18, 2025
    Sh2-126, also called the Great Lacerta Nebula or Star Funnel, is a vast, faint emission nebula in the constellation Lacerta,…
  • December 16, 2025
    Comet Lemmon's tail? The answer is blowing in the wind — the wind from the Sun in this case. This…
  • December 15, 2025
    A sideways spiral galaxy shines in today’s ESA/Hubble Picture of the Week. Located about 60 million light-years away in the…
  • December 14, 2025
    Everything you can see, and everything you could possibly see, right now, assuming your eyes could detect all types of…
  • December 13, 2025
    NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s mid-infrared image shows four coiled shells of dust around a pair of Wolf-Rayet stars known…
  • December 12, 2025
    Large galaxies grow by eating small ones. Even our own galaxy engages in a sort of galactic cannibalism, absorbing small…
  • December 11, 2025
    This cosmic close-up looks deep inside the Soul Nebula. The dark and brooding dust clouds outlined by bright ridges of…
  • December 10, 2025
    Sculpted by stellar winds and radiation, this dusty interstellar molecular cloud has by chance assumed an immediately recognizable shape. Fittingly…
  • December 9, 2025
    This glittering blue galaxy and subject of today’s ESA/Hubble Picture of the Week is a blue compact dwarf galaxycalled Markarian…
  • December 8, 2025
    For this new ESA/Webb Picture of the Month, the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has spied a pair of dwarf…