Starship Asterisk*

... There are in fact 2 animations at play simultaneously. The clouds evolve accelerated about 2 million times their normal speed independently of the rotation of the planet. /*Peter R ... which gives the impression that the central equatorial band of clouds is orbiting at an incredible speed. But ...

This is beautiful. I feel the wonder of the planets, the hope in scientific pursuit, and the love in a community effort. Thank you Peter Rosen and all the contributing observers from all over Earth. Thank you APOD team. Thank you for posting a beautiful and inspiring comment, which was even more lo...

This is beautiful. I feel the wonder of the planets, the hope in scientific pursuit, and the love in a community effort. Thank you Peter Rosen and all the contributing observers from all over Earth. Thank you APOD team.

Even though it's well below the "freezing temperature" water up there, contrails (like other high altitude clouds) can actually be made of mostly liquid droplets, "super-cooled", they might freeze eventually but for a while that cloud is made of liquid, multiply scattering light ...

Very interesting! I think the contrail is at higher altitude than the ice layer the whole time, and it looks reasonably fresh, probably made of mostly small liquid cloud droplets, which do multiple scattering of the sunlight, bouncing it all around so there's no wavelength dependence and it appears ...

I loved viewing this image in full resolution to enjoy the tiny red background interacting galaxy pair looking so similar to Arp 240! Anyone with some cosmology knowledge out there, if the universe were spatially closed and surprisingly small, could you have a view like this, looking out far enough ...

The blue-ringed spiral near the bottom-center of the image is very interesting. Upon close inspection it looks like there is a small round object silhouetted in front of it. Is this real, or an artifact? Good eye, to have noticed that. I really like the coloring of that galaxy. I hope you find out ...

Great explanation of the apparent motion being the sum of the meteor's motion and the Earth's. I had such a wonderful time observing the Geminid meteor shower this year! I really feel like I saw almost a meteor a minute here only about 40 miles outside of NYC.

Then the 46 degree halo, more often called the circum-horizontal arc The 46° halo and circumhorizontal (or circumhorizon) arcs are different phenomena. They are not synonymous. Getting corrected by Chris is like a dream come true, I always appreciate reading your clear comments on here. Did a bit m...

Definitely lots of confusing terminology. In some cases the circumscribed halo can have arc like shapes (like an astrological Mercury sign, good analogy). But not in all cases, sometimes it is just an almost circular halo with an oval-like bulge towards the sides. Here is a good picture of one: http...

You're right, it's not really well described compared to Atmospheric Optics POD (understandable, it is that site's focus) and I think there's only really good evidence for 3 halos here based on what I've read there. For the 22 degree halo, the two "different" halos are basically the colore...

...From whence came the banging material, what was there before there was a before, why is there something rather than nothing... I'd bet you're familiar with the type of responses which usually surround these types of questions, and I too am unsatisfied. But I think I might have thought of somethi...

Found this on the Port Douglas, Australia wikipedia page, it's a city in the path of totality. The first ever Solar Eclipse Marathon is being organised in Port Douglas to coincide with the Total Solar Eclipse in November 2012.[citation needed] This 42.195 km Marathon will race over 2,000 competitors...

http://oi49.tinypic.com/2lky1yh.jpg Yes this little nebula to the side steals the show... the turrets in the background scatter light like clouds on Earth with the sun behind them, glowing extra bright at the edges. The way the star (or stars) hidden behind the dark cloud seem just about to peek ou...

Re: "Normal cloud bottoms are flat. This is because moist warm air that rises and cools will condense into water droplets at a specific temperature, which usually corresponds to a very specific height. " Wouldn't this mean the TOPS should be flat ? As different parcels of clear air rise, ...

As I scrolled down my jaw dropped further and further - what a beautiful picture!

In a class discussion about ethics, I recall a teacher asking a student to define the end of a beings life. "When all their cells stop reproducing," he answered. So the teacher said, "By that definition there is only one creature on Earth, and it hasn't died yet." I like thinking...

There shouldn't be... I didn't see it... if other people are seeing a Scientology ad, though, then that has some severe consequences. The editors should refrain from using YouTube videos in the future. I think you see ads that have to do with your search history. My ad was for some geography softwa...

El Cielo Canarias is translated "Canary Skies" in the opening title. But the word "cielo" reminds me of the English word "ceiling" which has connotations of a roof, or enclosure. "Le ciel" is the French word for the sky. I know in English we can say either &q...

El Cielo Canarias is translated "Canary Skies" in the opening title. But the word "cielo" reminds me of the English word "ceiling" which has connotations of a roof, or enclosure. "Le ciel" is the French word for the sky. I know in English we can say either &qu...

I like the idea of an impact then slowly raining down debris as Vesta spins underneath... but if that's the south pole by right hand rule, I think the Coriolis force would provide a curl of the spiral in the other direction? What if Vesta was slowly rammed by a similarly large body with a different ...

There is no such thing as "good writing" only good re-writing, as a professor of mine used to say. :) I can't believe it wasn't until I was 20 years old that I really realized the sun was a star, but close up. I probably heard it a bunch of times in school, but it never clicked until I wat...

Clicking the Khalifa Tower link takes you to a google map view that reveals businesses in the adjacent mall, particularly Fatburger, a restaurant I have enjoyed in Tempe, Arizona. I know it might not be the best U.S. export, but I do love that we have a global culture, it does make me feel like I li...

I think a better title would be "Shadow Road to the Moon" to be more illustrative of the remarkable perspective of distance shown.

So is it the dark dust shown in this picture that is counter rotating, or more like the large faint extension shown in this image: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap070802.html ?

Thank you,

Ian