Gallery: WIRED Space Photo of the Day 2013
Photos by NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA01trifidneb
A storm of stars is brewing in the Trifid nebula, as seen in this view from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. The stellar nursery, where baby stars are bursting into being, is the yellow-and-orange object dominating the picture. Yellow bars in the nebula appear to cut a cavity into three sections, hence the name Trifid nebula. Colors in this image represent different wavelengths of infrared light detected by WISE. The main green cloud is made up of hydrogen gas. Within this cloud is the Trifid nebula, where radiation and winds from massive stars have blown a cavity into the surrounding dust and gas, and presumably triggered the birth of new generations of stars. Dust glows in infrared light, so the three lines that make up the Trifid, while appearing dark in visible-light views, are bright when seen by WISE. The blue stars scattered around the picture are older, and they lie between Earth and the Trifid nebula. The baby stars in the Trifid will eventually look similar to those foreground stars. The red cloud at upper right is gas heated by a group of very young stars. The Trifid nebula is located 5,400 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. Blue represents light emitted at 3.4-micron wavelengths, and cyan (blue-green) represents 4.6 microns, both of which come mainly from hot stars. Relatively cooler objects, such as the dust of the nebula, appear green and red. Green represents 12-micron light and red, 22-micron light. Caption: [NASA](http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17834)
Photos by NASA/JPL-Caltech02curiosityanseladams
This landscape scene photographed by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows rows of rocks in the foreground and Mount Sharp on the horizon. Curiosity's Navigation Camera (Navcam) took the component images for this mosaic during a pause in driving on the 548th Martian day, or sol, of the rover's work on Mars (Feb. 19, 2014). The Sol 548 drive covered 328 feet (100 meters). Images taken from orbit and used in planning the rover's route toward lower slopes of Mount Sharp had piqued researchers interest in the striations on the ground that are formed by these rows of rocks. This particular outcrop is called "Junda." Similar striations are apparent on other patches of ground along the planned route. The view is centered toward south-southeast and spans about 160 degrees. It is presented as a cylindrical projection. Caption: [NASA/JPL](http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17947)
03366633main-stephq-1920-full
Stephan's Quintet, a compact group of galaxies discovered about 130 years ago and located about 280 million light years from Earth, provides a rare opportunity to observe a galaxy group in the process of evolving from an X-ray faint system dominated by spiral galaxies to a more developed system dominated by elliptical galaxies and bright X-ray emission. Being able to witness the dramatic effect of collisions in causing this evolution is important for increasing our understanding of the origins of the hot, X-ray bright halos of gas in groups of galaxies. Caption: [NASA](http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_1408.html)
04This galaxy contains a gargantuan jet blasting away from a central supermassive black hole.
Just weeks after NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory began operations in 1999, the telescope pointed at Centaurus A (Cen A, for short). This galaxy, at a distance of about 12 million light years from Earth, contains a gargantuan jet blasting away from a central supermassive black hole. Since then, Chandra has returned its attention to this galaxy, each time gathering more data. And, like an old family photo that has been digitally restored, new processing techniques are providing astronomers with a new look at this old galactic friend. This new image of Cen A contains data from observations, equivalent to over nine and a half days worth of time, taken between 1999 and 2012. In this image, the lowest-energy X-rays Chandra detects are in red, while the medium-energy X-rays are green, and the highest-energy ones are blue. As in all of Chandra's images of Cen A, this one shows the spectacular jet of outflowing material - seen pointing from the middle to the upper left - that is generated by the giant black hole at the galaxy's center. This new high-energy snapshot of Cen A also highlights a dust lane that wraps around the waist of the galaxy. Astronomers think this feature is a remnant of a collision that Cen A experienced with a smaller galaxy millions of years ago. The data housed in Chandra's extensive archive on Cen A provide a rich resource for a wide range of scientific investigations. For example, researchers published findings in 2013 on the point-like X-ray sources in Cen A. Most of these sources are systems where a compact object - either a black hole or a neutron star - is pulling gas from an orbiting companion star. These compact objects form by the collapse of massive stars, with black holes resulting from heavier stars than neutron stars. The results suggested that nearly all of the compact objects had masses that fell into two categories: either less than twice that of the Sun, or more than five times as massive as the Sun. These two groups correspond to neutron stars and black holes. This mass gap may tell us about the way massive stars explode. Scientists expect an upper limit on the most massive neutron stars, up to twice the mass of the Sun. What is puzzling is that the smallest black holes appear to weigh in at about five times the mass of the Sun. Stars are observed to have a continual range of masses, and so in terms of their progeny's weight we would expect black holes to carry on where neutron stars left off. Although this mass gap between neutron stars and black holes has been seen in our galaxy, the Milky Way, this new Cen A result provides the first hints that the gap occurs in more distant galaxies. If it turns out to be ubiquitous, it may mean that a special, rapid type of stellar collapse is required in some supernova explosions. Caption: [Chandra Telescope Team](http://chandra.si.edu/photo/2014/cena/)
Photos by NASA/JPL/University of Arizona05hirisedunes
Russell Crater dunes are a favorite target for HiRISE images not only because of their incredible beauty, but for how we can measure the accumulation of frost year after year in the fall, and its disappearance in the spring. The frost is, of course, carbon dioxide ice that often sublimates (going directly from a solid to a gas) during the Martian spring. HiRISE takes images of the same areas on Mars in order to study seasonal changes like this. In an area like Russell Crater--a very ancient impact crater about 140 kilometers in diameter--we can follow changes in the terrain by comparing images taken at different times. This helps give us a better understanding of active processes on the Red Planet. Caption: [HirRISE Science Team](http://hirise.lpl.arizona.edu/ESP_034234_1255)
Photos by NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS06dingogap
This scene combines images taken by the left-eye camera of the Mast Camera (Mastcam) instrument on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover during the midafternoon, local Mars solar time, of the mission's 526th Martian day, or sol (Jan. 28, 2014). The sand dune in the upper center of the image spans a gap, called "Dingo Gap," between two short scarps. The dune is about 3 feet (1 meter) high. The nearer edge of it is about 115 feet (35 meters) away from the rover's position when the component images were taken, just after a Sol 526 drive of 49 feet (15 meters). The image has been white-balanced to show what the rocks would look like if they were on Earth. A version with 200-centimeter (79-inch) scale bars is available as Figure A. Caption: [NASA](http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA17766)
Photos by Solar Dynamics Observatory/NASA07Xflare-20140107
The largest sunspot group of the solar cycle unleashed a large (X1.2 class) flare just when it was facing right towards Earth (Jan. 7, 2014). The flare was associated with a coronal mass ejection that was heading in our direction and could generate some bright aurora here when it impacts our magnetosphere. More flares are expected from this magnetically complex region in the next week or so: stay tuned! These images were produced using a combination of two wavelengths of extreme ultraviolet light. *Caption: [NASA/SDO](http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/main/item/479)*
Photos by ESA/NASA, Acknowledgement: Nick Rose08hubbleexplodestar
Floating at the center of this new Hubble image is a lidless purple eye, staring back at us through space. This ethereal object, known officially as \[SBW2007\] 1 but sometimes nicknamed SBW1, is a nebula with a giant star at its center. The star was originally twenty times more massive than our sun, and is now encased in a swirling ring of purple gas, the remains of the distant era when it cast off its outer layers via violent pulsations and winds. But the star is not just any star; scientists say that it is destined to go supernova. Twenty-six years ago, another star with striking similarities went supernova — SN 1987A. Early Hubble images of SN 1987A show eerie similarities to SBW1. Both stars had identical rings of the same size and age, which were travelling at similar speeds; both were located in similar HII regions; and they had the same brightness. In this way SBW1 is a snapshot of SN1987a's appearance before it exploded, and unsurprisingly, astronomers love studying them together. At a distance of more than 20 000 light-years it will be safe to watch when the supernova goes off. If we are very lucky it may happen in our own lifetimes. *Caption: [NASA](http://www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/11874010546/)*
09snm82spitzer
The closest supernova of its kind to be observed in the last few decades has sparked a global observing campaign involving legions of instruments on the ground and in space, including NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. This image shows Spitzer's view of the supernova's host galaxy, M82 or the "Cigar galaxy," on three separate dates: May 9, 2005; February 7, 2014; and February 12, 2014. The observations from February 7 reveal the presence of a bright spot -- the supernova -- not present in the prior observations. By February 12, the supernova has started to dim somewhat from its peak brightness in the first week of February. The supernova, dubbed SN 2014J, was first spotted by human observers on January 21, 2014. SN 2014J is glowing very brightly in the infrared light that Spitzer sees. The telescope was able to observe the supernova before and after it reached its peak brightness. Such early observations with an infrared telescope have only been obtained for a few Type Ia supernovas in the past. Dust in the M82 galaxy partially obscures observations in optical and high-energy forms of light. The infrared light that Spitzer sees in, however, can pass through this dust, allowing astronomers to peer directly into the heart of the aftermath of the stellar explosion. Caption: [NASA](http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17847)
Photos by NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS10drivingonmars
This look back at a dune that NASA's Curiosity Mars rover drove across was taken by the rover's Mast Camera (Mastcam) during the 538th Martian day, or sol, of Curiosity's work on Mars (Feb. 9, 2004). The rover had driven over the dune three days earlier. For scale, the distance between the parallel wheel tracks is about 9 feet (2.7 meters). The dune is about 3 feet (1 meter) tall in the middle of its span across an opening called "Dingo Gap." This view is looking eastward. The image has been white balanced to show what the Martian surface materials would look like if under the light of Earth's sky. A version with raw color, as recorded by the camera under Martian lighting conditions, is available as Figure 1. Caption: [NASA/JPL](http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA17944)
11northerngalaxies
NGC 2276 and NGC 2300 are "boundary" targets in that they are the northernmost objects in the New General Catalog of space stuff. Being this close to the north celestial pole (and Polaris) makes them challenging targets for equatorial telescopes. NGC 2276 is a beautiful spiral galaxy that is punctuated by pink star forming regions. In fact it has one of the highest rates of star formation that has been measured. Its neighbor, NGC 2300, appears as a regular elliptical galaxy that shows some evidence of shells (and perhaps former structure). Together these make a wonderful contrast at the boundaries of space and time. From my southern-mid-latitude the celestial pole is a mere 32 degrees above the horizon. Which means that although this field is always available- it is never high in the sky the challenges the telescope to point at it. Finally the field also contains some of the foreground galactic cirrus (IFN) that pervade these high declinations. Perhaps you can see hints of it at the bottom left. P.S. As far as I know, my statement is correct concerning NGC 2276 being the northernmost NGC object. The more famous cluster of NGC 188 is just a bit farther south. Let me know if I am mistaken. Caption: Adam Block
Photos by NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute12flyingover
This wide-angle image shows the south polar region of Saturn's moon Enceladus and outlines the area covered by the high-resolution mosaic combining data from the imaging science subsystem and composite infrared spectrometer aboard NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The outlined area focuses on Baghdad Sulcus, a fracture in the south polar region. Cassini captured the data for this wide-angle image during the spacecraft's close flyby of the moon Nov. 21, 2009. This image and others from that flyby are among the best visible light images Cassini will capture of the region around the "tiger stripes," -- the fissures that spray icy particles, water vapor and organic compounds -- compounds, before the moon's south polar region enters winter darkness for the coming years. This wide-angle view shows not only Baghdad Sulcus, but also other nearby fractures. Lit terrain seen here is on the leading hemisphere and Saturn-facing side of Enceladus (504 kilometers, 313 miles across). The south pole lies in shadow near the bottom middle of the image. The wide-angle view was acquired at a distance of approximately 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) from Enceladus and at a sun-Enceladus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 114 degrees. Scale in the wide-angle view is 116 meters (381 feet) per pixel. Caption: [Cassini Solstice Team](http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA11697)
Photos by NASA/JPL-Caltech/GSSR13asteroid2006DP14-full
A collage of radar images of near-Earth asteroid 2006 DP14 was generated by NASA scientists using the 230-foot (70-meter) Deep Space Network antenna at Goldstone, Calif., on the night of Feb. 11, 2014. Delay-Doppler radar imaging revealed that the asteroid is about 1,300 feet (400 meters) long, 660 feet (200 meters) wide, and shaped somewhat like a big peanut. The asteroid's period of rotation is about six hours. The asteroid is of a type known as a "contact binary" because it has two large lobes on either end that appear to be in contact. Previous radar data from Goldstone and the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico has shown that at least 10 percent of near-Earth asteroids larger than about 650 feet (200 meters) have contact binary shapes like that of 2006 DP14. The data were obtained over an interval of 2.5 hours as the asteroid completed about half a revolution. The resolution is about 60 feet (19 meters) per pixel. The data were obtained on Feb. 11 between 9:03 a.m. and 11:27 p.m. PST (12:03 a.m. to 2:27 a.m. EST on Feb. 12). At the time of the observations, the asteroid's distance was about 2.6 million miles (4.2 million kilometers) from Earth. That is about 11 times the average distance between Earth and its moon. The asteroid's closest approach to Earth occurred on Feb. 10, at a distance of about 1.5 million miles (2.4 million kilometers). Radar is a powerful technique for studying an asteroid's size, shape, rotation state, surface features and surface roughness, and for improving the calculation of asteroid orbits. While this asteroid would appear as no more than a point of light to optical telescopes, using planetary radar scientists are able to discern the physical characteristics of the asteroid and measure its exact distance from Earth. But, in order to point the enormous 230-foot (70-meter) dish antenna in the precise direction of the asteroid, numerous professional and amateur astronomers assisted in the days leading up to Feb. 11 by supplying observational data to help pinpoint the location. Radar measurements of asteroid distances and velocities often enable computation of asteroid orbits much further into the future than if radar observations weren't available. Caption: [NASA/JPL](http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-060)
Photos by NASA14tritonneptune
This dramatic view of the crescents of Neptune and Triton was acquired by Voyager 2 approximately 3 days, 6 and one-half hours after its closest approach to Neptune (north is to the right). The encounter put the spacecraft on a couse plunging southward at an angle of 48° to the plane of the ecliptic. This direction, combined with the current season of southern summer in the Neptune system, gives this picture its unique geometry. The spacecraft was at a distance of 4.86 million km (3 million miles) from Neptune when these images were taken so the smallest detail discernible is approximately 90 km (56 miles). Color was produced using images taken through the narrow-angle camera's clear, orange and green filters. Neptune does not appear as blue from this viewpoint because the forward scattering nature of its atmosphere is more important than its absorption of red light at this high phase angle (134°). Caption: [NASA](http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/multimedia/display.cfm?Category=Historical&IM_ID=2146)
