WR 134, Cygnus

The original Voyager 1 "Blue Movie" which records its approach during a period of over 60 Jupiter days (January 6 - February 3, 1979)

Hey. Why isn’t the moon landing a national holiday in the US. Isn’t that fucked up? Does anyone else think that’s absurd?

Over 800 terrestrial exoplanets visualized and arranged according to their equilibrium temperature and size.

chart by u/mVargic

Jupiter Swirling Storms l NASA Juno

Saturn and its amazing rings, observed by the Cassini probe on this day in 2004.

A beginner’s star-book, an easy guide to the stars and to the astronomical uses of the opera-glass, the field-glass and the telescope, 1912

Andromeda, If It Was Brighter

One of the largest structures in the night sky is visible with the naked eye, but if you live in a city, it's literally hiding just out of sight. Even in a dark area, it's not the easiest to immediately see, but the above image has brightened it up for us, to show us what the galaxy would look like, if only the sky was dark enough and the galaxy was a bit brighter.

The moon comparison is the best one, that is something we can all see in the night sky (unless you live in the UK, where you see mostly clouds).

Now imagine that galaxy stretching several moon-spans across the sky. That I hope gives you a minor taste of what it's like when using a small telescope or even binoculars, you first come across it.

If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, then it's well worth the search.

Near sunset, look for 3 objects which should be easy to locate, Venus and Jupiter (I'll come to this in a moment) low in the sky, the W of Cassiopeia and the Seven Sisters (Pleiades), and from that, you should find the location. Bare in mind it's several times the size of the moon, so you don't have to be too accurate, but if you can find the stars of Andromeda, that will help refine your search.

And finally that brings me on to the real star of the sky currently, Jupiter and Venus, the two brightest planets, very close together.

In fact, if you do have a really good pair of binoculars, or small telescope, this is a great time to view them. Venus often appears as a crescent like a phase of the moon, and Jupiter has it's 4 Galilean moons to spot.

Happy Spotting !

NGC 5189

NGC 5189 is a planetary nebula in the constellation Musca. It was discovered by James Dunlop on 1 July 1826, who catalogued it as Δ252. For many years, well into the 1960s, it was thought to be a bright emission nebula. It was Karl Gordon Henize in 1967 who first described NGC 5189 as quasi-planetary based on its spectral emissions