Starship Asterisk*

The Webb page (!) says that they are star clusters. "One galaxy speckled with star clusters appears near the bottom end of the bright central star’s vertical diffraction spike – just to the right of a long orange arc. The long, thin ladybug-like galaxy is flecked with pockets of star formation...

If we move left from the brightest star, there is a galaxy with a blood-red, nebulous feature in the middle.

Note how one of the lensed elongated orange background galaxies, at center right, is surrounded by at least ten distinct and quite bright orange dots! Amazing! What are those things? Ann bright orange dots.jpg IMHO one of the lensed elongated orange background galaxies, at center right is not lense...

The text says that the width of M85 is 50000 light years. M95 was also featured in APOD on 22/Mar/2012 (https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120322.html). That text mentions the width as 75000 light years. This image also includes supernova SN 2012aw. The very first entry of M95 in APOD was on 14/Mar/2007 (...

Stunning. I hope we get to see more images of different black holes, especially the one in our galaxy. I was wondering why the accretion disk does not have uniform brightness. "Because the disc is rotating, it appears brighter where it is moving towards us, and dimmer where it is moving away. T...

This one is bluer than previous images from the same source (Hubble Legacy Archive)

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap121108.html
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap140825.html

Wonder why that is and which of these depict the true colour(s) of the Tadpole.

Thanks

Anyone knows how this is related to the large-scale structure of the Universe derived from the Redshift surveys? In recent studies the universe appears as a collection of giant bubble-like voids separated by sheets and filaments of galaxies, with the superclusters appearing as occasional relatively ...

Sachet Nebula. The contents of the sachet are squeezed to one side!!

Why is this one called the first direct image of an exoplanet? It isn't. It is called the first direct image of an expolanet orbiting a star similar to our Sun . I must admit that I didn't read the first line of the explanation properly. My mistake. Sorry. The Gemini Observatory too clearly mention...

Hi,

Why is this one called the first direct image of an exoplanet? Yesterday's APOD showed an image of a planet around Beta Pictoris taken in 2003 itself.

Thanks

Any idea what is that bright object near the top of the image; the one just above what looks like a contrail? Perhaps an artifact? Thanks Look! It's a bird ... It's a plane ... No its Sup ... Aww, its just a plane's vapor trail . Actually, I was inquiring about the bright, round object above the va...

Any idea what is that bright object near the top of the image; the one just above what looks like a contrail? Perhaps an artifact?

Thanks

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090321.html

What do the blue areas represent? Lower energies of gamma ray? If so, what could be the sources? Gas? Globular clusters (like 47 Tuc which also appears blue)? Other galaxies?

Thanks

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/GLAST ... _best.html

Thanks

http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archiv ... 0/image/a/

Thanks

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap080621.html

The edge of the shadow of the left wall of the trench has a reddish tinge. I wonder what it is. The right wall shadow does not seem to have it.

Thanks

http://www.physorg.com/news94224296.html
http://www.space.com/imageoftheday/imag ... 70329.html

It would be great to see a large image of this featured in APOD.

Thanks

Karthik

Thanks Noel.

- Karthik

Harry, In the following page http://www.aao.gov.au/images/captions/aat098.html there is a link in the second sentence (of the description below the image) that leads to a "very deep image" which is supposed to show the other galaxy. I am unable to make out which one is the other deforming ...

Noel, Thanks for the explanation. I found an APOD explaining this. http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010415.html You had mentioned Diffraction spikes can help differentiate strong point light sources (e.g., nearby bright stars) from distant/dim points of light in a given image, Any idea why they do...

Not sure if this is what you want http://www.spiral-galaxies.com/NGC/NGC-2442.html One interesting thing I notice is that the two objects displaying diffraction spikes in the APOD image do not have any spikes in this image. I don't know much about diffraction spikes. Perhaps someone can explain why ...

You may know this one. It seems our galay could be a barred-spiral. Here a one year old article

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/0 ... y_way.html

Thanks
Karthik

After reading the explanation in the APOD for 07/Nov/2006 "Janus: Potato Shaped Moon of Saturn", I got some questions. Since I am not an expert in Astronomy, I thought I'll post those questions here and get some feedback. 1). Is this orbit-swapping possible at a planetary level? It may not...