Gallery: Space Photos of the Week: A Galaxy Breakin' All the Rules
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/hubble-unveils-a-tapestry-of-dazzling-diamond-like-stars">ASA, ESA, and J. Maíz Apellániz, Acknowledgment: N. Smith</a>01SPoW-Jan22-03
Trumpler 13 is a glittering star cluster that contains a collection of some of the brightest stars seen in our Milky Way galaxy. Because the cluster is only 500,000 years old, it has one of the highest concentrations of massive, luminous stars. The small, dark knot left of center is a nodule of gas laced with dust, and seen in silhouette. The blue-white stars are burning their hydrogen fuel so ferociously they will explode as supernovae in just a few million years. The combination of outflowing stellar “winds” and, ultimately, supernova blast waves will carve out cavities in nearby clouds of gas and dust. These fireworks will kick-start the beginning of a new generation of stars in an ongoing cycle of star birth and death.
<a href="http://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic1601b/"> ESO</a>02SPoW-Jan22-02
This is a color-composite image of the Carina Nebula, revealing exquisite details in the stars and dust of the region. The open star cluster Trumpler 14, a collection of very bright, young stars within the Carina Nebula, is marked with a red circle.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2016/hubble-spies-a-rebel">ESA/Hubble & NASA</a>03SPoW-Jan22-06
While most galaxies have a spiral or elliptical structure, NGC 5408 is an irregular galaxy, meaning it sports a messy, indefinable shape. The galaxy is also associated with an object known as an ultraluminous X-ray source, dubbed NGC 5408 X-1. Astrophysicists believe these sources to be strong candidates for intermediate-mass black holes.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/jpl/pia18353/janus-and-tethys">NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute</a>04SPoW-Jan21-04
Janus and Tethys demonstrate the main difference between small moons and large ones. It's all about the moon's shape. Moons like Tethys (660 miles across) are large enough that their own gravity is sufficient to overcome the material strength of the substances they are made of (mostly ice in the case of Tethys) and mold them into spherical shapes. But small moons like Janus (111 miles across) are not massive enough for their gravity to form them into a sphere. Janus and its like are left as irregularly shaped bodies.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/major-winter-storm-headed-for-eastern-us">NASA Goddard Rapid Response</a>05SPoW-Jan22-07
Blizzard 2016 captured by NASA and NOAA satellites. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard Suomi NPP satellite captured this image on January 20, 2016 at 19:30 UTC (2:30 p.m. EST), when the storm was over the central US. In the image, snow cover is visible in the Rockies and southern Great Lakes states.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/blizzard-bears-down-on-us-east-coast">NOAA/NASA</a>06SPoW-Jan22-08
Another Blizzard 2016 image. NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite snapped this image of the approaching blizzard around 2:35 a.m. EST on Jan. 22, 2016 using the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument's Day-Night band.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/aurora-and-the-pacific-northwest">ESA/NASA</a>07SPoW-Jan22-05
NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and ESA astronaut Tim Peake shared a [a series of aurora photos](https://www.flickr.com/photos/timpeake/sets/72157663612677991) taken from the ISS on January 20. The dancing lights of the aurora provide spectacular views on the ground, but also capture the imagination of scientists who study incoming energy and particles from the sun. Aurora are one effect of such energetic particles, which can speed out from the sun both in a steady stream called the solar wind and due to giant eruptions known as coronal mass ejections or CMEs.
<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/charon-s-night-side">NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI</a>08SPoW-Jan21-05
After its close approach to Pluto, New Horizons snapped this hauntingly beautiful image of the night side of Pluto’s largest moon, Charon, which is about as wide as Texas. The bright sliver of light on the lower left is illuminated by the sun, while the rest of the moon is cast into darkness but still faintly visible by light reflected off Pluto, just as “Earthshine” lights up a new moon each month. Charon’s south pole–toward the top of this image–entered polar night in 1989 and will not see sunlight again until 2107. The moon’s polar temperatures drop to near absolute zero during this long winter.
