July’s Stunning Space Pictures
July’s Stunning Space Pictures lead image
ESO/G. Beccari
(Inside Science) -- Fascinating photos of planets, stars and galaxies come together in this month’s astronomy slideshow. Check out recent snapshots of the swirling gases of Saturn and Jupiter, view a stellar nursery in the Orion Nebula, and learn how tricky it can be to estimate the size of an exoplanet.
This month, Hubble released a wide field image of galaxy cluster SDSS J1110+6459. This cluster contains hundreds of galaxies, including a distant background galaxy shown on the left as a distinctly blue arc. This galaxy contains star-forming regions that span only about 200 to 300 light-years across, contradicting previous theories that such regions had to be at least 3,000 light-years in size. (NASA/ESA/T. Johnson )
Space Telescope Science Institut/NASA and ESA
This comic explains how the sizes of some exoplanets may have to be revised from their original estimates. Even state-of-the-art telescopes can’t always tell one star from two very close stars, since extremely distant two-star systems can show up as one point of light. Due to this discrepancy, planets that orbit one of these distant binary stars could be bigger than astronomers initially estimated. (NASA/JPL-Caltech )
As the closest stellar nursey to our solar system, the Orion Nebula is a famed target for astronomical observations. In the past it has been studied by the VISTA telescope and HAWK-I imager. This month it was the OmegaCAM camera on the VLT Survey Telescope that captured the stellar favorite in great detail. Astronomers at the European Southern Observatory used the data to accurately determine the brightness and colors of the different stars in the nebula. (ESO/G. Beccari )
ESO/G. Beccari
Back in our own solar system, the Cassini spacecraft continues sending updates on its dive toward Saturn. On July 16, the spacecraft sent snapshots in red, green and ultraviolet spectral filters that were compiled into this false-color composite. It shows Saturn’s sunlit horizon enrobed in a gauzy haze. The photo was snapped at a distance of about 777,000 miles from the planet. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute )
Saturn’s neighbor Jupiter is also having its picture taken -- by the Juno spacecraft. Above is an image of the planet’s Great Red Spot in true color -- as it would appear naturally to human eyes. The shape is familiar, but the hues look unnervingly pale compared to traditional false-color images from cameras that use wavelengths beyond human eyesight. Citizen scientist Björn Jónsson created this image from data from the JunoCam imager -- the spacecraft’s color camera. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/BjornJonsson )
