Picture of the Day: Planet Mercury

 

PLANET MERCURY

 

Photograph by NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

 

This colorful view of Mercury was produced by using images from the color base map imaging campaign during MESSENGER’s primary mission. These colors are not what Mercury would look like to the human eye, but rather the colors enhance the chemical, mineralogical, and physical differences between the rocks that make up Mercury’s surface.

Young crater rays, extending radially from fresh impact craters, appear light blue or white. Medium- and dark-blue areas are a geologic unit of Mercury’s crust known as the “low-reflectance material”, thought to be rich in a dark, opaque mineral. Tan areas are plains formed by eruption of highly fluid lavas. The giant Caloris basin is the large circular tan feature located just to the upper right of center of the image.

The MESSENGER spacecraft is the first ever to orbit the planet Mercury, and the spacecraft’s seven scientific instruments and radio science investigation are unraveling the history and evolution of the Solar System’s innermost planet. During the one-year primary mission, MESSENGER acquired 88,746 images and extensive other data sets. MESSENGER is now in a yearlong extended mission.

Mercury is the smallest and closest to the Sun of the eight planets in the Solar System, with an orbital period of about 88 Earth days. Because it has almost no atmosphere to retain heat, Mercury’s surface experiences the greatest temperature variation of all the planets, ranging from 100 K (−173 °C; −280 °F) at night to 700 K (427 °C; 800 °F) during the day at some equatorial regions. [Source]

 

via MESSENGER’s Official Website

 

 

 

The 2013 Supermoon in Photos

 

On June 23, 2013 at 11:32 UTC the full moon was not only the closest and largest full moon of the year, it will also be the moon’s closest encounter with Earth for all of 2013. It will not be this close again until August 10, 2014.

Astronomers call this sort of close full moon a perigee full moon. The word perigee describes the moon’s closest point to Earth for a given month.

However, the word supermoon didn’t come from astronomy. Instead, it came from astrology. Astrologer Richard Nolle of the website astropro.com takes credit for coining the term supermoon. There are three full moons in 2013 that meet the definition of a supermoon – May, June and July. But the June 22-23 full moon is the most super of them all 🙂

Below you will find the days the moon is closest to Earth from 2011-2016:

2011: March 19 – 356,575 km
2012: May 6 – 356,955 km
2013: June 23 – 356,991 km
2014: August 10 -356,896 km
2015: September 28 – 356,877 km
2016: November 14 – 356,509 km

In the gallery below you will find some beautiful images of this year’s Supermoon. For more, there’s a Supermoon 2013 Flickr group created by NASA that has hundreds more for your enjoyment. A quick search for ‘2013 Supermoon’ will also yield some fantastic results!

[Source: EarthSky.org]

 

 

1. Mount Diablo State Park, California

Photograph by Google Earth Pics on Twitter (@GoogleEarthPics)

 

 

2.

Photograph by Benjamin Wellert

 

 

3. Centennial Mountains WSA, Montana

Photograph by Bob Wick/Bureau of Land Management

 

 

4.

Photograph by NASA/Goddard/LRO

 

 

5. Marina Bay Sands Skypark, Singapore

Photograph by Cheng Kiang Ng | ckphoto.net

 

 

6. Singapore

Photograph by Jeremy Chan

 

 

7. Basilica of Superga, Turin, Italy

Photograph by Stefano De Rosa

 

 

8. Washington D.C.

Photograph by Jeff Gamble

 

 

9. South of Seattle, Washington

Photograph by np1232 on Flickr

 

 

10. Washington Monument

Photograph by NASA/Bill Ingalls

 

 

 

 

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Picture of the Day: Australian Sunset from Space

 

AUSTRALIAN SUNSET FROM SPACE

 

Photograph by NASA

 

The sun is about to set in this scene showing parts of southwestern Australia, which was photographed by one of the Expedition 35 crew members aboard the International Space Station on April 1, 2013. Several of the orbital outpost’s solar array panels are seen in the foreground. For maximum resolution, check out the 4256×2832 pixel version to really appreciate the awesomeness of this photo.

Expedition 35 was the 35th long-duration mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The expedition started 13 March 2013 and ended on May 13, 2013. It marked the first time a Canadian astronaut – Colonel Chris Hadfield – was in command of the station.

Expedition 35 is also only the second time an ISS crew is led by neither a NASA astronaut, nor a Roscosmos cosmonaut, after Expedition 21 in 2009, when ESA astronaut Frank De Winne was in command.

 

via NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center on Flickr

 

 

 

ISS Cupola: The Window to the World

 

The Cupola is an ESA-built observatory module of the International Space Station (ISS). Its seven windows are used to conduct experiments, dockings and observations of Earth. It was launched aboard Space Shuttle mission STS-130 on 8 February 2010 and attached to the Tranquility (Node 3) module. The Cupola’s 80 cm (31 in) window is the largest ever used in space.

Its name derives from the Italian word cupola, which means “dome”. It is extremely important to the ISS astronauts, as previously they have been confined to looking out of small portholes or at best the 20-inch (50 cm) window in the US Destiny laboratory.

Specifications
Overall height: 1.5-metre (4.9 ft)
Maximum diameter: 2.95-metre (9.68 ft)
Launch mass: 1,805-kilogram (3,979 lb)
On Orbit mass: 1,880-kilogram (4,145 lb)
Dome: Forged Al 2219-T851
Skirt: Al 2219-T851
Windows: Fused silica and borosilicate glass
MDPS shutters: DuPont Kevlar/3M Nextel sheets
Electrical power: Node 120 V Interface
Top window: 80-centimetre (31 in) diameter
Thermal control: goldised Kapton multi-layer insulation blanket

Below you will find a gallery of NASA photos from the Cupola. It’s offers the ultimate view of our beautiful planet and is one that only a select few have had the privilege of witnessing.

[Sources: NASA, Wikipedia]

 

1.

Photograph by NASA

 

Inside the Cupola, NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy, an Expedition 36 flight engineer, uses a 400mm lens on a digital still camera to photograph a target of opportunity on Earth some 250 miles below him and the International Space Station. Cassidy has been aboard the orbital outpost since late March and will continue his stay into September.

 

2.

Photograph by NASA

 

One of the Expedition 31 crew members working in the Cupola aboard the International Space Station, flying about 240 miles above Earth, recorded this frame featuring a non-tropical cyclone located over northern Saskatchewan, Canada. Lake Manitoba (lower center) and Lake Winnipeg (lower right) are visible. The structure on the upper right is part of the Japanese Experiment Module’s Exposed Facility (JEF). The hardware at top includes part of the port truss structure (solar arrays and radiators, and part of one of the ExPRESS Logistics Carriers).

 

3.

Photograph by NASA

 

Backdropped by the blackness of space, NASA astronaut Ron Garan, Expedition 28 flight engineer, is pictured in a window of the Cupola of the International Space Station.

 

4.

Photograph by NASA

 

This unusual image was photographed through the Cupola on the International Space Station by one of the Expedition 30 crew members. The lake just above the bracket-mounted camera at center is Egirdir Golu in Turkey, located at 38.05 degrees north latitude and 30.89 degrees east longitude. A Russian Soyuz spacecraft is docked to the station at lower right and part of the Permanent Multipurpose Module (PMM) can be seen just above it. The photo was taken on Dec. 29, 2011.

 

5.

Photograph by NASA

 

An Expedition 26 crew member used a fish-eye lens attached to an electronic still camera to capture this image of the Cupola of the International Space Station.

 

6.

Photograph by NASA

 

Inside the Cupola, NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy, an Expedition 36 flight engineer, eyeballs a point on Earth some 250 miles below him and the International Space Station before pinpointing a specific photo target of opportunity. He holds a digital still camera, equipped with a 400mm lens. Cassidy has been aboard the orbital outpost since March and will continue his stay into September.

 

7.

Photograph by NASA

 

An Expedition 31 crew member aboard the International Space Station, flying approximately 240 miles above Earth, recorded a series of images of the current wild fires in the west and southwestern United States. For this particular image, taken from the station’s Cupola, he used a 16mm lens, which gives this view a “fisheye” affect. The fires give rise to thick smoke plumes on the southernmost extremity of the Wyoming Range, which occupies the bottom left portion of the image. Three helicopters and more than 100 personnel are fighting the fire, which is being managed by the Bridger–Teton National Forest. Part of a docked Russian Soyuz spacecraft and the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) are at lower right.

 

8.

Photograph by NASA

 

NASA astronaut Ron Garan, Expedition 28 flight engineer, views a point on Earth through one of the windows in the Cupola of the International Space Station.

 

9.

Photograph by NASA

 

NASA astronaut Doug Wheelock, Expedition 25 commander, uses a still camera to photograph the topography of a point on Earth from a window in the Cupola of the International Space Station.

 

10.

Photograph by NASA

 

A fish-eye lens attached to an electronic still camera was used to capture this image of NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, Expedition 26 commander, in the Cupola of the International Space Station.

 

11.

Photograph by NASA

 

A low pressure system in the eastern North Pacific Ocean is featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 27 crew member in the Cupola of the International Space Station. This vigorous low pressure system has started to occlude—a process associated with separation of warm air from the cyclone’s center at the Earth’s surface. This view shows the arc of strong convection beyond the center of the low pressure, formed as the low occludes when the cold front overtakes the warm front. This occurs around more mature low pressure areas, later in the process of the system’s life-cycle.

 

12.

Photograph by NASA

 

Russian cosmonaut Dmitri Kondratyev (left), Expedition 27 commander; and Italian Space Agency/European Space Agency astronaut Paolo Nespoli in the Cupola, use still cameras to photograph the topography of points on Earth. Picture taken by 3rd crew member, Cady Coleman. From left to right outside the cupola Progress M-09M, Soyuz TMA-20, the Leonardo module and Kounotori 2.

 

13.

Photograph by NASA

 

This is a composite of a series of images photographed from a mounted camera on the Earth-orbiting International Space Station, from approximately 240 miles above Earth. Expedition 31 Flight Engineer Don Pettit relayed some information about photographic techniques used to achieve the images: “My star trail images are made by taking a time exposure of about 10 to 15 minutes. However, with modern digital cameras, 30 seconds is about the longest exposure possible, due to electronic detector noise effectively snowing out the image.
 
To achieve the longer exposures I do what many amateur astronomers do. I take multiple 30-second exposures, then ‘stack’ them using imaging software, thus producing the longer exposure.” A total of 46 images photographed by the astronaut-monitored stationary camera in the Cupola were combined to create this composite. Other locations on the orbital outpost were used by the crew to mount cameras to achieve other composites.

 

14.

Photograph by NASA

 

Self portrait of Tracy Caldwell Dyson in the Cupola module of the International Space Station observing the Earth below during Expedition 24.

 

15.

Photograph by NASA

 

This unique photographic angle, featuring the International Space Station’s Cupola and crew activity inside it, other hardware belonging to the station, city lights on Earth and airglow was captured by one of the Expedition 28 crew members. The major urban area on the coast is Brisbane, Australia. The station was passing over an area southwest of Canberra.

 

 

 

 

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Picture of the Day: Cat’s Eye Nebula

 

CAT’S EYE NEBULA

 

Photograph by ESA, NASA, HEIC and The Hubble Heritage Team STScI/AURA)

 

From spacetelescope.org:

In this detailed view from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the so-called Cat’s Eye Nebula looks like the penetrating eye of the disembodied sorcerer Sauron from the film adaptation of “Lord of the Rings.”
 
The nebula, formally catalogued NGC 6543, is every bit as inscrutable as the J.R.R. Tolkien phantom character. Although the Cat’s Eye Nebula was the first planetary nebula ever to be discovered, it is one of the most complex planetary nebulae ever seen in space. A planetary nebula forms when Sun-like stars gently eject their outer gaseous layers to form bright nebulae with amazing twisted shapes.

 

The image above was released back on September 9, 2004. The nebula is located some 3000 light years away.

 

via ESA/Hubble

 

 

 

Picture of the Day: Sunrise from Space

 

SUNRISE FROM SPACE

 

Photograph by NASA

 

In this beautiful capture, the sun is about to come up over the South Pacific Ocean. The colorful scene was photographed by one of the Expedition 35 crew members aboard the Earth-orbiting International Space Station between 4 and 5 a.m. local time, May 5, 2013.

The outpost was at a point above Earth located at 27.4 degrees south latitude and 110.1 degrees west longitude, a few hundred miles east of Easter Island.

 

via NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center on Flickr

 

 

 

Picture of the Day: The Sun – One Year, One Image

 

THE SUN – ONE YEAR, ONE IMAGE

 

Photograph by NASA/GSFC/SDO

 

In the three years since it first provided images of the sun in the spring of 2010, NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory has had virtually unbroken coverage of the sun’s rise toward solar maximum, the peak of solar activity in its regular 11-year cycle.

The image above is a composite of 25 separate images spanning the period of April 16, 2012, to April 15, 2013. It uses the SDO AIA wavelength of 171 angstroms and reveals the zones on the sun where active regions are most common during this part of the solar cycle.

SDO’s Atmospheric Imaging Assembly captures a shot of the sun every 12 seconds in 10 different wavelengths. The composite image shown here is based on a wavelength of 171 angstroms, which is in the extreme ultraviolet range and shows solar material at around 600,000 kelvins (about 1.08 million F). In this wavelength it is easy to see the sun’s 25-day rotation as well as how solar activity has increased over three years.

These images have regularly caught solar flares and coronal mass ejections in the act, types of space weather that can send radiation and solar material toward Earth and interfere with satellites in space. SDO’s glimpses into the violent dance on the sun help scientists understand what causes these giant explosions — with the hopes of some day improving our ability to predict this space weather. [Source: Solar Dynamics Observatory]

 

 

via NASA Goddard Space Flight Center on Flickr

 

 

 

Saturn’s 2000 km Wide Hurricane Eye

Photograph by NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI

 

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has provided scientists the first close-up, visible-light views of a behemoth hurricane swirling around Saturn’s north pole. Scientists say the hurricane’s eye is about 1,250 miles (2,000 kilometers) wide, 20 times larger than the average hurricane eye on Earth. Thin, bright clouds at the outer edge of the hurricane are traveling 330 mph (150 meters per second). The hurricane swirls inside a large, mysterious, six-sided weather pattern known as the hexagon.

This image is among the first sunlit views of Saturn’s north pole captured by Cassini’s imaging cameras. When the spacecraft arrived in the Saturnian system in 2004, it was northern winter and the north pole was in darkness. Saturn’s north pole was last imaged under sunlight by NASA’s Voyager 2 in 1981; however, the observation geometry did not allow for detailed views of the poles. Consequently, it is not known how long this newly discovered north-polar hurricane has been active. [Source]

[via Cosmic Log on NBC News]

 

Photograph by NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI

 

The images were taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Nov. 27, 2012, using a combination of spectral filters sensitive to wavelengths of near-infrared light. The images filtered at 890 nanometers are projected as blue. The images filtered at 728 nanometers are projected as green, and images filtered at 752 nanometers are projected as red. In this scheme, red indicates low clouds and green indicates high ones.

The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 261,000 miles (419,000 kilometers) from Saturn and at a sun-Saturn-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 94 degrees.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado. [Source]

 

Photograph by NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI

 

Cassini changes its orbital inclination for such an observing campaign only once every few years. Because the spacecraft uses flybys of Saturn’s moon Titan to change the angle of its orbit, the inclined trajectories require attentive oversight from navigators. The path requires careful planning years in advance and sticking very precisely to the planned itinerary to ensure enough propellant is available for the spacecraft to reach future planned orbits and encounters. [Source]

 

 

 

 

 

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Picture of the Day: Atop Earth’s Atmosphere

 

ATOP EARTH’S ATMOSPHERE

 

Photograph by NASA Earth Observatory

 

In this breathtaking photograph we see the crescent moon through the top of Earth’s atmosphere. The image was taken above 21.5°N, 113.3°E by International Space Station crew Expedition 13 on July 20, 2006 over the South China Sea, just south of Macau.

The atmosphere of Earth is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by Earth’s gravity. The atmosphere protects life on Earth by absorbing ultraviolet solar radiation, warming the surface through heat retention (greenhouse effect), and reducing temperature extremes between day and night (the diurnal temperature variation).

The atmosphere becomes thinner and thinner with increasing altitude, with no definite boundary between the atmosphere and outer space. The Kármán line, at 100 km (62 mi), or 1.57% of the Earth’s radius, is often used as the border between the atmosphere and outer space. [Source]

 

via NASA Earth Observatory

 

 

 

Picture of the Day: The Bahamas from Space

 

THE BAHAMAS FROM SPACE

 

Photograph by NASA

 

In this breathtaking photograph we see the Bahamas from orbit on January 13, 2013. The photo was taken by a member of Expedition 34 aboard the International Space Station. Expedition 34 consisted of six crew members who were on the ISS from 18 November 2012 to 15 March 2013. The Bahamas is a country consisting of more than 3,000 islands, cays and islets in the Atlantic Ocean.

 

NASA Expedition 34 via The Atlantic’s In Focus