Have you ever seen a fireball? In astronomy, a fireball is a very bright meteor — one at least as bright as Venus and possibly brighter than even a full […]

Can some supernovas explode twice? Yes, when the first explosion acts like a detonator for the second. This is a leading hypothesis for the cause of supernova remnant (SNR) 0509-67.5. […]

Nebulas are perhaps as famous for being identified with familiar shapes as perhaps cats are for getting into trouble. Still, no known cat could have created the vast Cat’s Paw […]

About 1,300 images from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft’s wide angle camera were used to compose this spectacular view of a familiar face – the lunar nearside. But why is […]

The sixth object in Charles Messier’s famous catalog of things which are not comets, Messier 6 is a galactic or open star cluster. A gathering of 100 stars or so, […]

This month, bright planet Saturn rises in evening skies, its rings oriented nearly edge-on when viewed from planet Earth. And in the early morning hours on July 6, it posed […]

What is going on with this galaxy? NGC 2685 is a confirmed polar ring galaxy – a rare type of galaxy with stars, gas and dust orbiting in rings perpendicular […]

As the Sun set, a bright Full Moon rose on July 10. Its golden light illuminates clouds drifting through southern hemisphere skies in this well-composed telephoto image from Conceição do […]

Transfusing sunlight as the sky grew darker, this exceptional display of noctilucent clouds was captured on July 10, reflected in the calm waters of Vallentuna Lake near Stockholm, Sweden. From […]

Stars are forming in Lynds Dark Nebula (LDN) 1251. About 1,000 light-years away and drifting above the plane of our Milky Way galaxy, LDN 1251 is also less appetizingly known […]