APOD Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss You currently sit at the black hole’s photon sphere, where light can travel endlessly in a circle due to the star’s great gravitational pull. The apparent position of the photon sphere is always easy to spot – itContinue Reading
Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft that launched NASA’s Crew Flight Test astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to the International Space Station is pictured docked to the Harmony module’s forward port. Credit: NASA During a news conference at 3 p.m. EDT on Monday, Sept. 28, NASA and Boeing leadership will discuss Starliner’sContinue Reading
APOD Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss As before, from this orientation, the black hole’s enormous gravity bends light to make two discernible images of the constellation Orion. You now descend to the photon sphere. A photon sphere is a location where gravity is soContinue Reading
APOD Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss The first frame is dark as you peer into the black hole itself. You begin to look up and stars come back into view. Now the stars are more blue than ever before as starlight that has fallenContinue Reading
APOD Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss The first frame shows a background sky highly distorted by the black hole in the center. The gravity of the black hole is so great that it actually deflects the background starlight. Large light bending effects cause theContinue Reading
The General Assembly pledged to help countries threatened by sea-level rise, but many challenges remain. By Dan Gearino This week’s United Nations General Assembly in New York featured pleas for urgent action on climate change, with heads of state and Secretary-General António Guterres warning that the window for action isContinue Reading
The Nature of the Universe Debate:Cosmology Solved? Peebles – Turner Baird AuditoriumThe Smithsonian InstitutionNational Museum of Natural History 1998 October 4; Debate Program 1 – 4:30 pm Sponsors: Smithsonian National Museum of Natural HistoryNational Science FoundationNational Aeronautics and Space AdministrationMichigan Technological UniversityUniversities Space Research Association Program Organizers: Robert Nemiroff, JerryContinue Reading
NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory has resumed use of its third science instrument, the Burst Alert Telescope, after the mission returned to data collection in August. Flight controllers have also allowed the spacecraft to resume automatically repointing its other telescopes to examine new high-energy flashes in the sky. The returnContinue Reading
APOD Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss Debate Proceedings Six published papers from the 1998 debate appeared in the 1999 March issue of the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. The proceedings include an opening commemoration of David N. Schramm by the moderator,Continue Reading
Minister of Industry and Technological Research Rossano Fabbri signed on behalf of San Marino. Gregory Mann, NASA Europe representative, and U.S. Consul General in Florence Joseph Tordella participated in the event on Friday, Sept. 25, 2026. Credit: U.S. Department of State The Republic of San Marino became the 76th signatoryContinue Reading
EDWIN POWELL HUBBLE November 20, 1889-September 28, 1953 from an article by N.U. Mayallin BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRS NAS 41 Courtesy NASA SpaceLink Edwin Hubble, by his inspired use of the largest telescope of his time, the 100 inch reflector on the Mount Wilson Observatory, revolutionized our knowledge of the size, structure,Continue Reading
Cosmic Origins … Cosmic Origins Community Galaxies SIG Seminar, 6… About Community Executive Committee Science Groups Conferences Cosmic Pathfinders Early Career Workshop Opportunities Missions Studies News & Events Resources Galaxies SIG Seminar Galaxies Science Interest Group Galaxies SIG about Galaxies SIG Seminar Location Virtual DAtes 6 October 20261:00pm ETContinue Reading
Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus XL cargo spacecraft fires its engines while berthed to the Unity module, lifting the International Space Station’s orbit on Aug. 27, 2026. NASA Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus XL spacecraft today fired its thrusters for 18 minutes boosting the International Space Station’s orbit. The Cygnus XL’s gimbaled delta velocity engine was used to adjustContinue Reading