Posts Tagged ‘hubble’
December 20, 2011
by yaska77
Keeping it seasonal, today’s astro advent calendar image bears more than a passing resemblance to a Xmas time favourite.
It’s a bit of a break from featuring images we’ve posted throughout the year too (as this is brand new) but the great thing about space being so vast is we keep being brought more jaw-dropping images! 
Day 20
Astronomy Advent Calendar 20th December - Hubble brings you a celestial snow angel! (click to enlarge) - Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope presents a festive holiday greeting that’s out of this world. The bipolar star-forming region, called Sharpless 2-106 (nearly 2,000 light-years away) looks like a soaring, celestial snow angel. The “wings” of the nebula detail the contrast of heat and motion against the backdrop of a colder medium.
A ring of dust and gas orbiting the star acts like a belt, cinching the expanding nebula into an “hourglass” shape. Hubble’s sharp resolution reveals ripples and ridges in the gas as it interacts with the cooler interstellar surrounding.
Detailed studies have also uncovered several hundred brown dwarfs. At purely infrared wavelengths, more than 600 of these sub-stellar objects appear, “failed” stars weighing less than a tenth of our Sun.
The Hubble images were taken in February 2011 with the Wide Field Camera 3 and released on 15th December.
More info from Hubblesite here.
A space snow angel, awesome
View yesterday’s image
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Posted in Astronomy, Hubble, Nebula, Night sky, yaska77 | Tagged advent calendar, Astronomy, astrophotography, Christmas, hubble, image, photography, postaweek2011, Snow Angel | 2 Comments »
December 5, 2011
by yaska77
Todays fifth advent calendar count-down image ventures much farther away from home than our previous pictures have managed. Taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, this image is the first of what I’m sure will be many to feature in this count-down. There’s still plenty of days still to come!
Day 5
Astronomy Advent Calendar 5th December - Hanny’s Voorwerp looks like a ghostly slimer (click to enlarge) - Credit: NASA/ESA/W. Keel (University of Alabama) and the Galaxy Zoo Team
In 2007 Dutch High School teacher Hanny van Arkel spotted this ghostly cosmic blob while participating in the online Galaxy Zoo project. Named Hanny’s Voorwerp (Hanny’s Object in Dutch), it appears as a solitary green island near to a normal-looking spiral galaxy (IC 2497)
Astronomers have since found that Hanny’s Voorwerp is the only visible part of a 300-light-year-long gaseous streamer stretching around the galaxy. The green section is only visible because a beam of light (powered by a black hole driven quasar) is illuminating it from the nearby galaxy’s core
Looks like a giant ghostly slimer in space
See you tomorrow!
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Posted in Astronomy, Hubble, yaska77 | Tagged advent calendar, Astronomy, astrophotography, count-down, green slimer, Hanny's Voorwerp, hubble, image, photography, postaweek2011, space | 2 Comments »
December 4, 2011
by tte-77
Four newly found red galaxies. Credit: David A. Aguilar (CfA)
Astronomers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) have discovered four examples of a new “species” of very red galaxy in the early universe. Located 13 billion light-years from Earth not even Hubble can see it. Being sensitive to infrared light NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has been able to reveal not one, but four very red galaxies. It’s a mystery though… what makes them so red in colour?
Astronomers can’t explain it. They might be very dusty or might contain many old, red stars, they may even be very distant. All three reasons seem to apply to the these newly discovered galaxies.
Interestingly all four galaxies are grouped near each other and appear to be physically associated. Due to their great distance, viewing from Earth shows them as they were only a billion years after the Big Bang when the first galaxies formed.
Researchers plan to search for more examples of this new “species” of very red galaxies analyzing more Spitzer and Hubble observations to track them down.
Source: EarthSky
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Posted in Astronomy, Galaxy, NASA, Spitzer, tte-77 | Tagged astonomers, Center for Astrophysics, colour, discovery, distance, earth, galaxies, Harvard, hubble, image, infared, NASA, postaweek2011, red, space, Space Telescope, Spitzer, telescope | Leave a Comment »
November 15, 2011
by yaska77
The bright clusters and nebulae of our night sky are often named after insects or flowers, and NGC 6302 is no exception!
What a massive wingspan! The Butterfly Nebula (NGC 6302) as imaged from Hubble in 2009 (click to enlarge) - Credit: NASA/ESA & Hubble SM4 ERO Team
With an estimated surface temperature of around 250,000°C, the central star of this particular planetary nebula is exceptionally hot, though its bright ultraviolet light is hidden from view by a dense ring of dust.
This amazingly detailed close-up image of the dying star’s nebula was captured by the Hubble Space Telescope soon after its upgrade in 2009.
This “Butterfly Nebula” lies about 4,000 light-years away in the constellation of Scorpius (the Scorpion).
Utterly beautiful and totally awesome
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (13th November)
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Posted in ESA, Hubble, Image gallery, NASA, Nebula, yaska77 | Tagged APOD, Astronomy, Butterfly Nebula, hubble, image, NGC 6302, photograph, picture, postaweek2011, Space Telescope | 1 Comment »
August 14, 2011
by tte-77
The amazing Necklace Nebula - Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
On 2 July, 2011 NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope’s Wide Field Camera 3 snapped this image of a newly discovered planetary nebula. The Necklace Nebula is located 15,000 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Sagitta.
Created from the glowing remains of an ordinary sun-like star, the Necklace Nebula consists of a bright ring – 12 trillion miles wide – dotted with dense, bright knots of gasses that resemble the diamonds of a necklace.
The composite image shows the nebula glowing in blue (hydrogen), green (oxygen) and red (nitrogen).
Also named PN G054.2-03.4, a pair of stars orbiting close together produced the nebula. About 10,000 years ago, one of the aging stars expanded to the point where it engulfed its companion. The smaller star continued orbiting inside its larger companion, increasing the giant’s rotation rate.
The bloated companion star spun so fast that a large part of it expanded into space. Due to centrifugal force, most of the gas escaped along the star’s equator which produced the ring.
The two companions are so close (two million miles or so) that they appear as one bright dot in the center. The stars are furiously whirling around each other, completing an orbit in little more than a day.
To find out more visit the official Hubble site here.
Isn’t space wonderful! 
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Posted in Astronomy, Hubble, Image gallery, Nebula, tte-77 | Tagged 12 trillion, Astronomy, camera, composite, constellation, diamond, earth, gas, gasses, hubble, image, NASA, Nebula, necklace, Necklace Nubula, PN G054.2-03.4, postaweek2011, ring, Sagitta, skywatching, space, star, Stars, telescope, Wide Field Camera, wonderful | Leave a Comment »
