保护地球，探索宇宙，发现文明
Dr. George Carruthers, a scientist at the Naval Research Laboratory, stands to the right of his invention, the gold-plated ultraviolet camera/spectrograph. The first Moon-based observatory, Carruthers developed it for the Apollo 16 mission. He stands beside his colleague William Conway. Working for the Naval Research Laboratory, Carruthers had three years ea...
Magnetic fields in NGC 1068, or M77, are shown as streamlines over a visible light and X-ray composite image of the galaxy from the Hubble Space Telescope, NuSTAR or the Nuclear Spectroscopic Array, and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The magnetic fields align along the entire length of the massive spiral arms — 24,000 light years across (0.8 kiloparsecs) — im...
2020年12月30日 Jupiter and Saturn Great Conjunction: The Movie Video Credit: Thanakrit Santikunaporn (National Astronomical Research Institute of Thailand); Text: Matipon Tangmatitham Explanation: Yes, but have you seen a movie of Jupiter and Saturn’s Great Conjunction? The featured time-lapse video was composed from a series of images taken from Thailand...
2020年12月29日 Earth During a Total Solar Eclipse Video Credit: GOES-16, ABI, NOAA, NASA Explanation: What does the Earth look like during a total solar eclipse? It appears dark in the region where people see the eclipse, because that’s where the shadow of the Moon falls. The shadow spot rapidly shoots across the Earth at nearly 2,000 kilometers per hour,...
2020年12月28日 M16: Inside the Eagle Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Nicolas Paladini Explanation: From afar, the whole thing looks like an Eagle. A closer look at the Eagle Nebula, however, shows the bright region is actually a window into the center of a larger dark shell of dust. Through this window, a brightly-lit workshop appears where a whole open c...
2020年12月27日 Cosmic Latte: The Average Color of the Universe Color Credit: Karl Glazebrook & Ivan Baldry (JHU) Explanation: What color is the universe? More precisely, if the entire sky were smeared out, what color would the final mix be? This whimsical question came up when trying to determine what stars are commonplace in nearby galaxies. The answer, d...
2020年12月26日 Fox Fur, Unicorn, and Christmas Tree Image Credit & Copyright: Miguel Claro (TWAN, Dark Sky Alqueva) Explanation: Clouds of glowing hydrogen gas fill this colorful skyscape in the faint but fanciful constellation Monoceros, the Unicorn. A star forming region cataloged as NGC 2264, the complex jumble of cosmic gas and dust is about 2,700 ligh...
Taken aboard Apollo 8 by Bill Anders, this iconic picture shows Earth peeking out from beyond the lunar surface as the first crewed spacecraft circumnavigated the Moon, with astronauts Anders, Frank Borman, and Jim Lovell aboard. Image Credit: NASA 这幅标志性的照片摄于比尔·安德斯（Bill Anders）的阿波罗8号（Apollo 8）上，这是地球上第一架第一艘载人宇宙飞船绕月飞行时从月球表面窥视的情况，宇航员安德斯（Anders），弗兰克·博尔曼（Frank Bo...
2020年12月25日 Northern Winter Night Image Credit & Copyright: Adam Block Explanation: Orion always seems to come up sideways on northern winter evenings. Those familiar stars of the constellation of the Hunter are caught above the trees in this colorful night skyscape. Not a star at all but still visible to eye, the Great Nebula of Orion shines below the ...
2020年12月24日 Portrait of NGC 1055 Image Credit & Copyright: Martin Pugh Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 1055 is a dominant member of a small galaxy group a mere 60 million light-years away toward the aquatically intimidating constellation Cetus. Seen edge-on, the island universe spans over 100,000 light-years, a little larger than our own M...