NASA’s Goldstone Solar System Radar, located in California’s Mojave Desert, recently made some detailed observations of asteroid 2010 JL33 on December 11 and 12, 2010 as it tumbled through space at a distance of 5.3 million miles – 22 times further away than the Moon! The radar images have also been assembled into a…
Month: January 2011
Photo Trivia Answer
The answer has been posted to the first LITD Photo Trivia! Check it out on the original article. I think I gave everyone enough opportunity to guess… 🙂
Saturn’s Skyline
A raw image from Cassini taken on January 9, 2011, this minimally-composed image is actually quite fascinating (IMO): it’s a look at the upper levels of Saturn’s atmosphere in methane wavelength! Yes, Saturn is a gas giant and most of its volume is made up of hydrogen and helium, but there are layers of its…
Photo Trivia
In the tradition of Universe Today’s “Where in the Universe” series, here’s a little space exploration-based photo trivia for you: what is pictured in the above image? It’s something that many of you are already familiar with, and it’s not outside of our solar system…..but that’s all the clues I’m giving! 🙂 I know one…
Eclipses From Orbit
Can’t see the video below? Click here to watch. In another view of Tuesday’s partial solar eclipse, the European Space Agency’s Proba-2 satellite captured this video of the Moon passing in front of the Sun from its position in low-Earth orbit. Taken in extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light, best for observing details of the Sun’s corona,…
From the LITD Archives: Final Flight
Originally posted on January 6, 2010. A reminder that our solar system is a dynamic place, where gravity is the rule of the game and there’s rarely a prize for second place. On January 3, the European Space Agency’s SOHO solar observatory spacecraft captured images of a comet flying towards the Sun….and then disappearing into…
A World Turned Inside Out
Take a nice long look at this beautiful image of Io, the most volcanically active world in our solar system! This was assembled by Ted Stryk from Voyager 1 images, taken as the spacecraft passed by on March 4, 1979. At 2,263 miles (3642 km) wide Io is the third largest of Jupiter’s moons and…
Lines of Light
The line of Saturn’s edge – or “limb” – glows brightly with backlit sunlight, as do its rings, in this wonderful image from Cassini, color-calibrated by Gordan Ugarkovic. Beige and blue colors can be seen in the layers of Saturn’s upper atmosphere, and the distant arc of the rings seem to sink into this before…
Partial Eclipse Over Holland
Here’s a gorgeous photo of this morning’s partial eclipse by Arjan Almekinders from the Netherlands! The eclipse was visible to most of Europe, as well as parts of north Africa and western Asia. While the amount of light in the sky was not diminished dramatically during this eclipse according to some observers, it was noted…
2010 in Review
I got my new WordPress report card for 2010…the results are below. Not sure if they grade on a curve but I would say I got at least a solid “B+”. 🙂 _______________ The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its…
At Crater’s Edge
Here’s a fantastic look at an inner wall of Santa Maria crater on Mars, the latest stop for the rover Opportunity on its travels across the Meridiani plain. Colorized by Stuart Atkinson for his Opportunity-dedicated blog The Road to Endeavour, this is a section of a larger panoramic image showing the crater’s rim and jumbled…