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Astronomy Picture Of the Day (APOD)
Solar Sail
8.03.2003
Nearly 400 years ago astronomer Johannes Kepler observed comet tails blown by a solar breeze and suggested that vessels might likewise navigate through space using appropriately fashioned sails. It is now widely recognized that...
The Star Trails of Kilimanjaro
7.03.2003
The night had no moon, but the stars were out. And camped at 16,000 feet on Mt. Kilimanjaro, photographer Dan Heller recorded this marvelous 3 1/2 hour long exposure. Here the landscape is lit mostly by the stars.
Comet NEAT in Southern Skies
6.03.2003
After last month's dramatic swoop past the Sun, Comet NEAT (C/2002 V1) appeared as a naked-eye comet, emerging from the evening twilight in planet Earth's southern skies. On March 1st, New Zealand...
Where People Live on Planet Earth
5.03.2003
Where do people live on Planet Earth? Although people inhabit every continent, the highest population densities occur in Asia. Sparsely inhabited regions occur on virtually every continent, however, including the Sahara Desert in Africa...
In the Center of the Lagoon Nebula
4.03.2003
The center of the Lagoon Nebula is busy with the awesome spectacle of star formation. Visible in the lower left, at least two long funnel-shaped clouds, each roughly half a light-year long, have been formed by extreme stellar winds and intense energetic starlight. The tremendously bright nearby star, Hershel 36, lights the area.
Will the Universe End in a Big Rip
3.03.2003
How will our universe end? Recent speculation now includes a pervasive growing field of mysterious repulsive energy that rips virtually everything apart. Although the universe started with a Big Bang, analysis of recent cosmological measurements allows a possibility that it will end with a Big Rip.
In the Center of the Trapezium
2.03.2003
Start with the constellation of Orion. Near Orion's belt is a fuzzy area known as the Great Nebula of Orion or M42. In this nebula is a bright star cluster known as the Trapezium, shown above. New stellar systems are forming there in gigantic globs of gas and dust known as Proplyds.
Stereo Eros
1.03.2003
Get out your red/blue glasses and float next to asteroid 433 Eros, 170 million kilometers away! Orbiting the Sun once every 1.8 earth-years, asteroid Eros is a diminutive 40 x 14 x 14 kilometer world of undulating horizons, craters, boulders and valleys.
Fox Fur, the Unicorn, and a Christmas Tree
28.02.2003
Glowing hydrogen gas fills this gorgeously detailed sky view centered on the variable star S Mon in the faint but fanciful constellation Monoceros, the Unicorn. A star forming region (NGC 2264), the complex jumble...
When Moons and Shadows Dance
27.02.2003
It's no wonder Jupiter is a favorite target for even modest earthbound telescopes. The most massive planet in the solar system with four of the largest moons also boasts the famous Great Red Spot, a giant hurricane-like storm system over three hundred years old.
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