Starship Asterisk*

Anyone know the altitude of this expanding cloud of space debris? If one follows the links toward the end of the caption in today's APOD , one might be led to believe this could bring the end of satellite deployment and space exploration as we know it, as the debris blows apart other satellites and ...

Seems to be working fine today.

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apo ... rst+nebula

-Noel

Scientists say we're made up, at least in part, of second-hand star material. That's how we explain all the heavy elements.

Seeing the immense scale of Davide's image, it' s less difficult to imagine the filaments of a supernova remnant coalescing into new solar systems.

-Noel

Even more basic, I don't think fledgling solar systems glow like this.

-Noel

Could be an f/4 scope and a wide angle eyepiece, though the long train of optics outside the scope probably implies otherwise. It IS pointed QUITE a long way from the nova, even for a low power scope. It's possibly a compositional error on the part of the people shooting the photo, or maybe they wer...

I do so love the sparkle Mr. Gendler puts in his images. Utter beauty.

-Noel

BMAONE23, that's a good theory, but please rest assured the APOD folks are receiving far more unique images than they are publishing. Many, many astroimages are produced by amateur astronomers worldwide each day, and ever more are of astonishing quality as the equipment continues to improve.

-Noel

A gigapixel! Wow, now THAT's a mosaic. Well done, Davide! How does Photoshop handle images that large? Do you have a 64 bit system with tens of gigabytes? Or did you edit in some other app? Just curious. Wouldn't a photograph of a faint structure that encompasses that large an area of the sky be com...

Can some one explain to me how to insert an image into my post. You'll need to host the image on a web server of your choice; as far as I know this board does not provide space for images. Once you've done that, the easiest way is to press the [ Img* ] button while posting, which gives you an BBCod...

Yes, they sometimes present the same images several times. I suspect it is so that people who happened to miss truly inspiring images with interesting facts the first time around will get a chance to see them when they go back up. I know I've seen several my first time that way. Also note that the A...

I saw them and thought the same thing too. Having never seen such ripples before I'm inclined to think "artifacts" myself.

-Noel

I suppose we'll know if parts of Mars start to turn green.

-Noel

Edit: It's an old image, from Endurance crater on Sol 180, 7/26/2004. See: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/mer/images.cfm?id=738 Anyone notice the little round light spot in the image, just to the left of the shadow of the rover's "knee"? Could that be the remnant of a geyser, or maybe ju...

We've sent a collection of robot explorers to Mars. They've been there a while. We know the assembly teams were careful to make sure they were clean. We know the conditions of space travel were harsh. We know that the climate on Mars is very different from that on the Earth, and is very cold and wit...

Interesting thoughts, though I wonder with a system as complex as an entire planet and with a small sample size whether one could infer the sun is the cause if, say, the Mars cap were to be shown to be smaller.

Still, without the influence of life on Mars the system IS rather simpler...

-Noel

I didn't process this specific image, but I am versed in Hubble image processing so I'll answer... The short answer is that this is not a true visual color image. Most Hubble images are captured using colored filters set up for scientific study, rather than for visual image representation (though th...

Amazing how different the rings look in reflection than in transmission. Note the Encke division, for example, near the outside edge... At the start of the sequence there is but one main line, but at the end we see many more subtle ring lines around it.

-Noel

It's a beautiful image.

It seems pretty clear to me that the part facing the camera has taken a HUGE impact, and the whole side of Hyperion has collapsed (or been pushed in) as a result. I wonder if the other side appears blown out.

Definitely a satellite with more holes than swiss cheese!

-Noel

Bear in mind I made this Witch Head image from IR, Red, and Blue exposures. Looking at the original plate data, I'd say it is unlikely the spot at (2880,970) was dust or a plate defect, as its shape is round with a bright center, and its sharpness seems to resemble that of the other objects in the i...

Here's a somewhat clearer image I made by combining multiple Hubble exposures. It also post-dates the APOD image by about 10 years. You can see a cloud growing where the star was.



-Noel

The photo write-up indicates it was observed in 1994. To make more current observations, what does this thing look like now ( 2007 ) ? It was first observed in 1994, and has been imaged at intervals ever since. You should know that the most recent Hubble images are held private for a year to allow ...

If one thinks more loosely - in terms of possible life, not just human - one can imagine that we are already seeing such things in just such clouds as pictured in this APOD. On another note, here we thought the L.A. smog was bad... Imagine being able to see a smog cloud from 20 million light years d...

As far as today's APOD(CG4), I am very intrigued by the 'asterism' below and to the left of the edge on galaxy. It is an almost perfect circle of stars. I know it is only a matter of perspective but it is unusual. I know what you mean! The more astrophotos I shoot the more I see unusual and unexpec...

I have heard of stars making close passes to black holes and being slingshotted (is that even a word?) at tremendous speed, even high enough to leave the galaxy, but I have never heard of stars or star clusters being "ejected" from black holes by any other means. Do you have any references...