Cassini’s view of Saturn’s rings on Jan. 8, 2015

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Saturn's rings on Jan. 8, 2015

This is a composite image created from three images that Cassini captured on Jan. 8, 2015. Cassini was approximately 581,474 miles (935,791 kilometers) from Saturn at the time the images were taken.

A star or one of Saturn’s moons looms near the F ring on the lefthand side.

The images were processed differently than usual and the final outcome based on similar imagery color from In Saturn’s Rings (screenshot).

Credit: NASA/JPL/SSI/@ObservingSpace

A year on the sun: From perihelion, to aphelion, to perihelion

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A Year on the Sun - 2014

This is a composite image of the sun created from 25 images captured by NASA’s SDO (a satellite that orbits Earth) throughout last year.

It’s inspired by a similar image created by NASA that covered a timespan from Apr. 16, 2012 through Apr. 15, 2013 and by another image created by Enrique Cervigón.

This new composite image starts on Jan. 4, 2014 on perihelion, when Earth is at its closest point in elliptical orbit to the sun, and ends on Jan. 4, 2015 on perihelion (Universal Time).

The vine video below animates the 25 images used in the composite. Aphelion, the point in Earth’s elliptical orbit when it’s farthest from the sun, occurred on Jul. 4, 2014.


Credit: NASA/SDO/@ObservingSpace

A Cosmic 9/11 Memorial

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A Cosmic 9/11 Memorial

The above image was created using real images captured by Hubble. On the left is NGC 3310, a galaxy with extremely active star formation. In the center is the SN 1006 remnant, a thin section from the leftovers of a supernova from a 1006 A.D. supernova event. On the right is IRAS 18059-3211, a sun-like star near the end of its life.

Credit: NASA/ESA/Hubble/@ObservingSpace

The sun unleashes an X class solar flare on Sep. 10, 2014

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Part of the sun on Sep. 10, 2014

Sunspot AR2158 unleashed an X1.6 class solar flare today. The pic above was created from four separate photogenic frames at different times from the video below and look at the area around sunspot AR2158. Earth is used as a scale. The pic looks at the sun in the 304, 171, 131, and 335 Angstrom wavelengths of light.

Here’s a video of a coronal mass ejection (CME) that the sun unleashed right after the X class solar flare.

Here’s a composite image of the sun just before the X class solar flare reached its maximum intensity level.

Composite image of the sun on Sep. 10, 2014

Photo credits: NASA/SDO