Latest Posts by alitheastronomer - Page 2

Apparently this is “The clearest photo of Mercury ever taken.”

The stunning Sombrero galaxy (seriously, there should be a blog that’s just photos of the Sombrero galaxy)

Three moons cast shadows on jupiter, taken by the NASA Hubble space telescope.

via reddit

Now at the age of 13, she had already: Attended Space Camp 7 times, Space Academy 3 times and Robotics Academy 1 time. Became the first person to complete all the NASA Space Camps in the world, including Space Camp Turkey and Space Camp Canada. Witness 3 Space Shuttle launches. Attend Sally Ride Camp at MIT, and three Sally Ride Day camps. Speak several foreign languages: Spanish, French, Chinese and some Turkish. She also delivers motivational speeches to other children.

She is determined to be the first person to land on Mars & NASA is already training her.

(Fact Sources: 1 2) Follow Ultrafacts for more facts

Mount Rainier shadow casts on the sky at sunrise. It only happens when the sun rises farther to the south and has to be in the exact position to where Rainier blocks the first rays of morning light. (Source)

This is a model of how many Earth’s can fit inside the sun. 

A Multi-Camera 360° Panoramic Timelapse of the Stars by Vincent Brady [VIDEO]

Solipsism syndrome refers to a psychological state in which a person feels that the world is not external to his or her mind. Periods of extended isolation may predispose people to this condition. In particular, the syndrome has been identified as a potential concern for individuals living in space for extended periods of time.

(Fact Source) Follow Ultrafacts for more facts

A solar eclipse and the Milky  Way seen from the ISS

The beautiful Milky Way taken in one of the most darkest skies in the world over Boa Vista in the Cape Verde Islands. photo by James Atkinson

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Sharpest View of the Andromeda Galaxy, Ever.

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the sharpest and biggest image ever taken of the Andromeda galaxy — a whopping 69,536 x 22,230 pixels. The enormous image is the biggest Hubble image ever released and shows over 100 million stars and thousands of star clusters embedded in a section of the galaxy’s pancake-shaped disc stretching across over 40,000 light-years.

Use the ZOOM TOOL to view in full detail.

(WARNING: May cause existential crisis)

astronomy is the one class i don’t mind studying for

Pluto (bottom image) with various other non-planets.

Since everyone has their knickers in a knot over Pluto not being a planet, here are various different celestial objects who are also not classified as planets. You’ll notice, just because it’s not called a “planet” doesn’t mean it isn’t cool.

Let us be reminded, there is no heirarchy of celestial bodies. It wasn’t necessarily “demoted” from planethood, it was simply reclassified as something else. There’s literally no reason to be emotionally attatched to the idea of Pluto’s planetary classifaction.

But what “classifies” a planet anyway?

According to the International Astronomical Union, there are 3 basic requirements that it must meet: 1) It orbits the sun 2) Sufficient mass to assume a “hydrostatic equilibrium” (meaning it’s mostly shaped like a globe) 3) Has “cleared its neighborhood” in its orbit.

The third one is where Pluto fails. What they mean by “clearing the neighborhood” is that the orbital path is good and clear. Every planet will still collide with something now and then but their orbital paths are not occupied by anything that is similar to the size of the planet itself. They’re not really in danger of running into much of anything except maybe an asteroid or a comet that might enter their path and collide.

In addition, here is an image showcasing the dwarf planets of the solar system. Pluto isn’t alone in it’s classification.

So don’t be sad over Pluto not being a planet, you’re just being melodramatic. Wipe your tears away with some scientific literacy. ;)

Whirlpool Galaxy by Alessandro Falesiedi

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The Hubble Space telescope just sent back a new photo of the Twin Jet Nebula. Here’s what it looked like in 1997:

And now …

Whoa. But wait, we also got an updated image of the merging galaxies NGC 6240. What it looked like in 2008:

And today:

Science, you’re the best. Oh, and the explanation behind those merging galaxies and their black holes is wild.

the most optimistic letter that any human has ever written

Hubble Sees a Galactic Sunflower : The arrangement of the spiral arms in the galaxy Messier 63, seen here in an image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, recall the pattern at the center of a sunflower.

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An eclipse, caught from a plane.

NGC 4522

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09/27/15

me: *thinks about space for 0.2 seconds*

me: *gets really motivated to do well and study hard in school so I can help explore it*

I believe in aliens but not like in the conspiracy theorist sense more like in the “the notion that in this infinitely-huge universe our planet is the only one with life on it is fucking absurd” sense