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M83
The Southern Pinwheel Galaxy (rotated)
Twelve million light-years away lies the galactic masterpiece Messier 83, also known as the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy. Its swirling spiral arms display a high rate of star formation and host six detected supernovae. This image was captured with the Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy...
M83
The Outskirts of the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy
Twelve million light-years away lies the galactic masterpiece Messier 83, also known as the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy. Its swirling spiral arms display a high rate of star formation and host six detected supernovae. This image was captured with the Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy...
Eagle Nebula
WISE Infrared View of the Eagle Nebula
The dusty face of the Eagle Nebula and its surroundings are revealed in this infrared image based on data from NASA’s Wide Field Survey Explorer (WISE). This large star forming region is about 5,700 light years away and is most famous for the “Pillars of Creation” images from the Hubble and...
NGC 2170
Star Formation in Monoceros
This infrared WISE image displays the Monoceros R2 molecular cloud, a site known as a stellar nursery. Most noticeable are the large glowing regions of dust, lit up and shaped by the bright glow of newly-born stars in the area.
California Nebula
WISE View of California Nebula
The California Nebula is seen in its entirety in this image from NASA’s WISE mission, covering over 25 square degrees of sky. In this infrared view, the dust clouds underlying the nebula glimmer in greens and reds. Also known as NGC 1499, it derives its common name from its similarity to the...
Aries Dust Clouds
Dusty Veil of Aries
This infrared image from NASA's WISE might look like the glow of aurorae in the night sky, but it actually reveals patterns of wispy dust that fills the space between stars. This region of sky in the constellation of Aries covers a large swath of sky, about as wide as the span of 11 full moons.
Vela Dust Clouds
Dust Pillars of Vela-Centaurus
These ghostly pillars span a large swath of sky about half the width of your outstretched hand held at arm’s length, falling along the boundary between the constellations of Vela and Centaurus. However, they have no common name and are not identified in historic catalogs like Messier or NGC for...
Gecko Nebula
Baby Stars of the Gecko
Skygazers have dubbed this region the “Gecko Nebula” for its resemblance to a downturned head with a pointed snout, though astronomers refer to the area as LBN 437. This cloud of dust and gas is a region of star formation, which is revealed clearly in infrared light by NASA’s WISE mission.
Brown Dwarf-Red Dwarf Binary Seen by NEOWISE.
This visualization shows a brown dwarf looming in the foreground, with its red dwarf companion floating far away. Some scientists believe that brown dwarfs could have bands or stripes similar in appearance to Jupiter.
Milky Way
Star Map of the Milky Way's Outer Halo
Images of the Milky Way and the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) are overlaid on a map of the surrounding area, our galaxy's galactic halo. Dark blue represents a low concentration of stars; lighter blues indicate increasing stellar density. The map spans from about 200,000 light-years to 325,000...
NGC 5367
The Star-Forming Tadpole NGC 5367
This tadpole-shaped nebula is known as CG12, an example of a “cometary globule” where a denser region of dust trails off into wispy strands. While challenging to see in visible light images, WISE easily shows the full extent of the globule’s tail as it lights up at longer wavelengths of infrared...
WOH G64
Image of the star WOH G64 taken by the VLTI
This is an image of the star WOH G64, taken by the GRAVITY instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope Interferometer (ESO’s VLTI). This is the first close-up picture of a star outside our own galaxy, the Milky Way. The star is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud,...
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