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G1
New look at the stars around the Milky Way's centre
A new view on the heart of our Milky Way is presented in today's Picture of the Week. This stunning snapshot, taken with ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), reveals the stars and gas surrounding an invisible giant — a supermassive black hole, located some 27 000 light-years away. This is a hugely...
NGC 6543
Looking at the Cat’s Eye Nebula with Hubble
For this month’s ESA/Hubble Picture of the Month, we turn our gaze to one of the most visually intricate remnants of a dying star: the Cat’s Eye Nebula, also known as NGC 6543. This extraordinary planetary nebula has captivated astronomers for decades with its elaborate and multilayered...
RCW 36
A cosmic hawk and its baby stars
Today’s Picture of the Week, taken with ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), seems to have captured a cosmic hawk as it spans its wings. While the dark clouds in the middle of the image make up the head and body of the bird of prey, the filaments extending away from the body to the left and right...
NGC 1269
The Cosmic Steering Wheel NGC 1269
This Image of the Week of NGC 1269 was taken utilizing the Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera (DECam), which is mounted on the U.S. National Science Foundation Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at NSF Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, a Program of NSF NOIRLab. NGC 1269...
Central Molecular Zone
Location of the Central Molecular Zone in the Milky Way
This image shows the location of the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ), a region at the core of our galaxy rich in dense and intricate gas clouds. This zone has been mapped with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), as part of the ALMA CMZ Exploration Survey or ACES. The inset is...
Central Molecular Zone
Largest ALMA image ever shows the molecular gas in the centre of the Milky Way
This image shows the complex distribution of molecular gas in the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ) of the Milky Way. It was obtained with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which ESO is a partner. This map is as long as three full Moons side-by-side in the sky, and it is in...
Central Molecular Zone
Different molecules in the centre of the Milky Way observed with ALMA
This montage shows the distribution of different molecules in the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ) of the Milky Way. The observations were made with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), as part of the ALMA CMZ Exploration Survey or ACES. ACES has mapped the distribution of...
Chamaeleon
Chamaeleon Infrared Nebula
A wide-field view of the area around the Chamaeleon Infrared Nebula.
AFGL 4106
Two's company
We humans are strongly influenced by the presence of companions over the course of our lives, shaping each other emotionally, culturally, or intellectually. This shaping effect is made literal in the case of stellar companions, which is the topic of today's Picture of the Week. The pair of...
1RXS J052832.5+283824
VLT image of a dead star creating a shock wave as it moves through space
The central square image, taken with the MUSE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope, shows shock waves around the dead star RXJ0528+2838. When a star moves through space it can push away nearby material creating a so-called bow shock, which in this image is glowing in red, green and blue....
1RXS J052832.5+283824
Wide-field view (PanSTARRS) of the area of the sky around the star RXJ0528+2838
This image from the PanSTARRS survey shows the region of the sky around the dead star RXJ0528+2838, which is located at the very centre of the image.
1RXS J052832.5+283824
Wide-field view (DSS) of the area of the sky around the star RXJ0528+2838
This image from the Digitized Sky Survey (DSS) shows the region of the sky around the dead star RXJ0528+2838, which is located at the very centre of the image.
Featured from the Archive
Pistol Nebula
The Pistol Star: A Brilliant Star in Milky Way's Core
One of the intrinsically brightest stars in our galaxy appears as the bright white dot in the center of this image taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble's Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) was needed to take the picture, because the star is hidden at the...
