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This pan video shows the region around the Swan Nebula (Messier 17). It is part of a bigger image of the area taken by the VLT Survey Telescope (VST) at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile.
The Swan Nebula Star Formation Region Close-up | ESO
Astronomers using data from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT), at the Paranal Observatory in Chile, have made an impressive composite of the nebula Messier 17, also known as the Swan Nebula. The painting-like image shows vast clouds of gas and dust illuminated by the intense radiation from young stars.
The image shows a central region about 15 light-years across, although the entire nebula is even larger, about 40 light-years in total. Messier 17 is in the constellation of Sagittarius (the Archer), about 6,000 light-years from Earth. It is a popular target for amateur astronomers, who can obtain good quality images using small telescopes.
These deep VLT observations were made at near-infrared wavelengths with the ISAAC instrument. The filters used were J (1.25 µm, shown in blue), H (1.6 µm, shown in green), and K (2.2 µm, shown in red). In the center of the image is a cluster of massive young stars whose intense radiation makes the surrounding hydrogen gas glow. To the lower right of the cluster is a huge cloud of molecular gas. At visible wavelengths, dust grains in the cloud obscure our view, but by observing in infrared light, the glow of the hydrogen gas behind the cloud can be seen shining faintly through. Hidden in this region, which has a dark reddish appearance, the astronomers found the opaque silhouette of a disc of gas and dust. Although it is small in this image, the disc has a diameter of about 20,000 AU, dwarfing our Solar System (1 AU is the distance between the Earth and the Sun). It is thought that this disc is rotating and feeding material onto a central protostar—an early stage in the formation of a new star.
Credit: European Southern Observatory (ESO)/R. Chini
This zoom video sequence takes us from a broad vista of the bright central parts of the Milky Way right into a close-up view of the bright star formation region Messier 17. The final detailed view is from the MPG/ESO 2.2-meter telescope at the European Southern Observatory’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.
Distance:5,500 light years
Credit: European Southern Observatory (ESO), N. Risinger
This video gives us a close-up view of the rose-colored star forming region Messier 17. The picture was captured by the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-meter telescope at the European Southern Observatory’s La Silla Observatory in Chile. It is one of the sharpest images showing the entire nebula and not only reveals its full size, but also retains fine detail throughout the cosmic landscape of gas clouds, dust and newborn stars.
This image of the rose-colored star forming region Messier 17, also known as the Swan Nebula,was captured by the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-meter telescope at the European Southern Observatory’s La Silla Observatory in Chile. It is one of the sharpest images showing the entire nebula and not only reveals its full size but also retains fine detail throughout the cosmic landscape of gas clouds, dust and newborn stars.
Zooming to Water in Terrestrial Planet-forming Zone of Star PDS 70's Disk
This animation explains the detection of water in the zone near the star PDS 70, where rocky planets usually form. First we see the starry sky and approach the position of PDS 70. Then the video shows two different observations of the planet-forming disk with the positions of the two gas giant planets. Finally, we see a section of the spectrum with the water signatures determined by the MIRI instrument on board the James Webb Space Telescope.
The animation is part of a Max Planck Institute for Astronomy press release:
Water in PDS 70 Star System's Protoplanetary Disc | James Webb Space Telescope
This spectrum of the protoplanetary disk of PDS 70, obtained with Webb’s MIRI instrument, displays a number of emission lines from water vapor.
This artist concept portrays the star PDS 70 and its inner protoplanetary disc.
New measurements from the NASA/European Space Agency/Canadian Space Agency James Webb Space Telescope’s Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) have indicated the presence of water vapor in the inner disc of the system PDS 70, located 370 light-years away. This is the first detection of water in the terrestrial region of a disc already known to host two or more protoplanets.
New insights may come from the system PDS 70, which hosts an inner disc and an outer disc that are separated by a gap of eight billion kilometers, within which are two known gas-giant planets. MIRI has detected water vapor in the system’s inner disc at distances of less than 160 million kilometres from the star—the region where rocky, terrestrial planets may be forming (the Earth orbits 150 million kilometers from our Sun).
PDS 70 is a K-type star, cooler than our Sun, and is estimated to be 5.4 million years old. This is relatively old amongst stars with planet-forming discs, which made the discovery of water vapor surprising.
Astronomers have not yet detected any planets forming within the inner disc of PDS 70. However, they do see the raw materials for building rocky worlds, in the form of silicates. The detection of water vapor implies that if rocky planets are forming there, they will have water available to them from the beginning.
"We’ve seen water in other discs, but not so close in and in a system where planets are currently assembling. We couldn’t make this type of measurement before Webb,” said lead author Giulia Perotti of a new science paper at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg, Germany.
“This discovery is extremely exciting, as it probes the region where rocky planets similar to Earth typically form,” added MPIA director Thomas Henning, a co-author of the paper. Henning is co-principal investigator of Webb’s MIRI (Mid-InfraRed Instrument), which made the detection, and the principal investigator of the MINDS (MIRI Mid-Infrared Disk Survey) program that took the data.
Chemicals Glow as Meteor Disintegrates in Earth's Atmosphere
Meteors can be colorful. While the human eye usually cannot discern many colors, cameras often can. Pictured here is a fireball, a disintegrating meteor that was not only one of the brightest the photographer has ever seen, but colorful. The meteor was captured by chance in mid-July 2023 with a camera set up on Hochkar Mountain in Austria to photograph the central band of our Milky Way galaxy. This radiant grit, likely cast off by a comet or asteroid long ago, had the misfortune to enter Earth's atmosphere. 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. Red, however, typically originates from energized nitrogen and oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere. This bright meteoric fireball was gone in a flash—less than a second—but it left a wind-blown ionization trail that remained visible for almost a minute.
Galaxy UGC 12295: A Galactic Island of Tranquillity | Hubble
The tranquil spiral galaxy UGC 12295 basks leisurely in this image from the NASA/European Space Agency Hubble Space Telescope. This galaxy lies around 192 million light-years away in the constellation Pisces, and is almost face-on when viewed from Earth, displaying a bright central bar and tightly wound spiral arms.
Image Description: A broad spiral galaxy seen directly face-on. It has two bright spiral arms that extend from a bar, which shines from the very center. Additional fainter arms branch off from these, studded with bright blue patches of star formation. Small, distant galaxies are dotted around it, on a dark background.
Despite appearing as an island of tranquillity in this image, UGC 12295 played host to a catastrophically violent explosion—a supernova— that was first detected in 2015. This supernova prompted two different teams of astronomers to propose Hubble observations of UGC 12295 that would sift through the wreckage of this vast stellar explosion.
Supernovae are the explosive deaths of massive stars, and are responsible for forging many of the elements found here on Earth. The first team of astronomers used Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) to examine the detritus left behind by the supernova in order to better understand the evolution of matter in our Universe.
The second team of astronomers also used WFC3 to explore the aftermath of UGC 12295’s supernova, but their investigation focused on returning to the sites of some of the best-studied nearby supernovae. Hubble’s keen vision can reveal lingering traces of these energetic events, shedding light on the nature of the systems that host supernovae.
Credit: European Space Agency (ESA)/Hubble & NASA, A. Filippenko, J. Lyman
Media Briefing: NASA's Climate Work in Wake of Record High Global Temperatures
[Audio Event Replay] NASA leadership, including climate experts, shed light on recent extreme weather events, and discuss how NASA research and data is enabling climate solutions.
Note: NASA chief scientist and senior climate adviser, Dr. Kate Calvin, begins speaking at the 7 minute, 30 second mark.
From wildfires raging across North America, flooding in the Northeast, heatwaves across the Southwest, and a record hot June in 2023, millions of Americans are experiencing the effects of extreme weather, and NASA is tracking it.
Participants include:
- NASA Administrator Bill Nelson
- Kate Calvin, NASA chief scientist and senior climate adviser
- Karen St. Germain, director, NASA’s Earth Science Division
- Gavin Schmidt, director, NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies
- Tom Wagner, associate director for Earth Action
- Huy Tran, aeronautics director, NASA’s Ames Research Center
- Carlos Del Castillo, chief, Ocean Ecology Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Sculpting Landscapes in Orion and De Mairan's Nebulae | Hubble
This glowing region of star formation reveals arcs and bubbles formed when stellar winds—streams of charged particles ejected by the Trapezium star cluster—collide with material in the Orion and De Mairan's Nebulae.
Distance:1,400 light years
Credit: NASA, European Space Agency (ESA), M. Robberto (Space Telescope Science Institute/ESA) and the Hubble Space Telescope Orion Treasury Project Team
The cosmic brush of star formation composed this alluring mix of dust and dark nebulae. Cataloged as Sh2-239 and LDN 1551, the region lies near the southern end of the Taurus molecular cloud complex some 450 light-years distant. Stretching for nearly 3 light-years, the canvas abounds with signs of embedded young stellar objects driving dynamic outflows into the surrounding medium. Included near the center of the frame, a compact, tell-tale red jet of shocked hydrogen gas is near the position of infrared source IRS5, known to be a system of protostars surrounded by dust disks. Just below it are the broader, brighter wings of HH 102, one of the region's many Herbig-Haro objects, nebulosities associated with newly born stars. Estimates indicate that the star forming LDN 1551 region contains a total amount of material equivalent to about 50 times the mass of the Sun.
The 0.81 m (32 in) Schulman Telescope is a Ritchey-Chrétien reflector built by RC Optical Systems and installed in 2010. It is operated by the Mount Lemmon SkyCenter and is Arizona's largest dedicated public observatory. The Schulman Telescope was designed from inception for remote control over the Internet by amateur and professional astrophotographers worldwide. It is currently the world's largest telescope dedicated for this purpose.
Image Credit & Copyright: Adam Block/Mount Lemmon SkyCenter/University of Arizona
This image was obtained with the wide-field view of the Mosaic camera on the Mayall 4-meter telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory. Sh2-239 is a distinct reflection nebula in which stars have been forming for quite some time. It contains two clusters of highly embedded very young stars as well as many stars that are more evolved. The many outflows are visible as bright red knots and jets, particularly in the cavity at the center-top of the image. The image was generated with observations in the B (blue), V (green), I (orange) and Hydrogen-Alpha (red) filters. In this image, North is left, East is down.
The Nicholas U. Mayall Telescope is a four-meter (158 inches) reflector telescope in Arizona named after Nicholas U. Mayall. It saw first light on February 27, 1973, and was the second-largest telescope in the world at that time.
Credit: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage) and H. Schweiker (WIYN and NOIRLab/NSF/AURA)
Colorful Night Sky over Paranal Observatory in Chile's Atacama Desert | ESO
Above Paranal Observatory, the skies regularly display a myriad of colors and astronomical sights, from the plane of the Milky Way shining brightly overhead to the orange-hued speck of Mars (left), the starry constellations of Scorpius and Orion, and the magenta splash of the Carina Nebula (upper middle). Despite the remote location there are also occasional signs of human activity, for example the sequence of lamps seen in the center of the frame. These faint lights illuminate the route from the Very Large Telescope (VLT) to the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) where this image was taken.
Due to the highly sensitive camera this photograph also showcases a mysterious phenomenon called airglow. The night sky is ablaze with deep red and eerie green hues, caused by the faint glow of Earth’s atmosphere. Because of airglow, no observatory site on Earth could ever be absolutely, completely dark—although the European Southern Observatory’s do come pretty close.
This image was taken by talented astronomer and photographer Yuri Beletsky,
China's Main Rocket Engine for Crewed Moon Missions Completes New Test
China on Saturday, July 22, 2023, completed a new trial run of the Long March-10 main rocket engine for its future crewed lunar missions, according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC).
China’s moon missions, which began with the uncrewed lunar-orbiter Chang’e 1 in 2007, are aimed at building a basic lunar research station by 2028. China plans to land humans on the Moon by 2030.
The 130-tonne class liquid oxygen kerosene rocket engine is an upgraded version of the current high-thrust engine being used in a new generation of carrier rockets such as the Long March-5.
The rocket engine will be used for Long March-10 carrier rockets in the country's crewed lunar missions. It will be used in the first-stage core and boosters of Long March-10.
The July 22, 2023, test verified relevant technical requirements for the engine, providing a solid basis for determining the engine's technologies and enhancing its reliability, according to the 6th Research Institute of the CASC, also known as the Xi'an Aerospace Propulsion Institute.
"The results of the engine's test run today have successfully met relevant requirements. The start and shutdown of the engine and its operation smoothness in high- and low-working conditions have been assessed, and the relevant parameters have been obtained," said Zhou Xianqi, a researcher at the Xi'an Aerospace Propulsion Institute.
"In the second half of this year, we will conduct several high-altitude simulation tests to finally determine the relevant performance and parameters of the engine, so as to make our due contributions to China's manned moon landing mission," said Zhou.
The new carrier rocket Long March-10 is mainly developed for the purpose of sending spacecraft and moon lander into the Earth-moon transfer orbit.
The rocket is expected to prepare for its maiden flight in 2027.
This image shows the amazing intricacies of the vast stellar nursery Gum 29. At its center lies the cluster of young stars Westerlund 2. One object at the bottom of the cluster is in fact a system of two of most massive stars known to astronomers. The image is based on data obtained with the Wide Field Imager (WFI) camera attached to the 2.2-meter Max-Planck/ESO telescope through four different filters (B, V, R, and H-alpha).
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