Starship Asterisk*

Superb image, particularly the corona which extends further than in many other images.

Just HOW is this a "Wolf" moon? There are no wolves on the island where I live, and few in Europe, and anyway the animals couldn't give a F&^*&^ about it! It's beautiful picture of a full moon! Why bring in all the false folkways? JOhn Indeed. There seems to be a bit of a trend fo...

Confused by the illumination of so much of Ganymede's surface. I was assuming that it was illuminated by the Sun, but that would mean only half the surface would be lit, whereas clearly from the image much more than half appears to be lit. Is Ganymede illuminated by Jupiter, or is there some pother...

Confused by the illumination of so much of Ganymede's surface. I was assuming that it was illuminated by the Sun, but that would mean only half the surface would be lit, whereas clearly from the image much more than half appears to be lit. Is Ganymede illuminated by Jupiter, or is there some pother ...

... But I was disappointed at the caption: APOD Robot wrote: Colors in meteors usually originate from ionized chemical elements released as the meteor disintegrates, with blue-green typically originating from magnesium, calcium radiating violet, and nickel glowing green. Blue-green? Like this? ███ ...

"Humans and all Earth-based life are carbon-based, " Well, we are just as much a water-based life form: "In adult men, about 60% of their bodies are water. However, fat tissue does not have as much water as lean tissue. In adult women, fat makes up more of the body than men, so they h...

I love the 'nod' to the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy 'Total Perspective Vortex' with the notice "You are here"

Thanks folks, you put a smile on my face.

Clicking on the image to get a larger picture, there are some dust clouds and a pink nebula to the bottom left of the image. What are these?

Strictly speaking a 'Henge' is an enclosed earthwork comprising a dyke surrounded by a ditch. (https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/inspire-me/what-is-a-henge/) However, due to the popularity of 'Stonehenge' in the UK (https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge/) and the unique...

I was wondering what the red clouds and blue halo indicate about the chemical composition of the nebula? I expect they are false colours to enhance the image, but it would be nice to know.

Thanks in advance of replies.

First time I've felt seasick viewing an APOD.

Great animation, though, I just like having the ecliptic horizontal-ish, or at least consistent.

I wonder how much water is bound up in living things? After all, animals are basically bags of water with some impurities and plant sap contains a high proportion of water.

The beauty of the universe never fails to amaze me.

"before the dawn of recorded human history," Well, the oldest know petroglyphs are around 40,000 years old, some in Australia are about 20,000 years old (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petroglyph ). Just because we do not know how to read them does not mean they are not 'recorded history'. ...

ASIDE:

I followed the link in the description for 'Makarians eyes' and the selected the 'Discuss' link fro the page https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap070608.html

I got a page offering me the opportunity to buy the web address.

If you have any questions about black holes, you can ask LIGO at:

https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/page/ask-ligo

I have in the past and received a prompt, comprehensive and very informative reply.

I wonder what effect the shadow has on the clouds and weather on Jupiter.

On Earth a total solar eclipse means the temperature drops noticeably for a few minutes, but we are a lot closer to the sun, so maybe this effect would not be so strong on Jupiter.

Any suggestions?

"The ice was singing ..." There is also the intriguing possibility that the Aurora Borealis creates audible noise at ground level: https://theconversation.com/do-the-northern-lights-make-sounds-that-you-can-hear-168032 . "... a Finnish study in 2016 claimed to have finally confirmed t...

When a comet can no longer produce a tail; does it become an asteroid? The terminology isn't rigorously defined. In common usage, an asteroid is any rocky body above a certain size but not meeting the definition of a planet. There are almost certainly bodies we identify as asteroids that started ou...

What planet us that at the 4:30 position? Venus? As Venus, and all other astronomical objects, would have the same position relative to the sun in the frame, Venus should appear 24 times, like the sun. So it may be something more terrestrial, that was only visible once in the 'day' when the multipl...

Question: Does the collision of two black holes (or neutron stars) radiate gravitational waves equally in all directions? Just wondering if there was a difference between the energy radiated in the plane of their mutual orbit and the perpendicular, and if so how that affects the special image receiv...

The spiral is not completely even, in that there are parts which have a smaller radius of curvature than the adjacent arcs to either side. These 'corners' appear to my eyes to be regular and repeated through the layers of the spiral so that each layer has the same number of corners, and in roughly t...

Since the sunrise takes weeks, does the green flash last proportionally longer? Good question. Since the green flash is capturing a consequence of atmospheric dispersion when the Sun is just below the horizon, it should get easier and easier to see it as you get closer to the poles and the rate the...

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/40/Strasbourg%2C_Rat_King_retusche.jpg/800px-Strasbourg%2C_Rat_King_retusche.jpg <<A rat king is a collection of rats whose tails are intertwined and bound together by one of several possible mechanisms, such as entangling material like hair or...

The story is told that Buzz Aldrin was upset that HE wasn't the first man to walk on the Moon's surface. Armstrong was chosen because he was a civilian -- NASA wanted to emphasize that they were not military. Therefore, Aldrin refused to photograph Armstrong on the Moon, despite many admonitions fr...