#PPOD: Saturn's moon Enceladus was caught spraying icy vapor into space from its south pole. Image taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on May 2, 2012. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Jason Major
#PPOD: Though #Mars is the Red Planet, false-color images can help us learn about its weather and geology. This image shows various wind-related features on the Red Planet near the center of Gamboa Crater. Larger sand dunes form sinuous crests and individual domes. There are tiny ripples on the tops of the dunes, only several feet from crest to crest. These merge into larger mega-ripples about 30 feet apart that radiate outward from the dunes. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
#PPOD: From yesterday's eclipse live stream, scientist Ryan Lambert captured a special moment during totality when he removed the solar filter from his Unistellar Odyssey telescope. At the bottom of the disk, peeking out from behind the Moon is a large solar prominence. A smaller one can be seen at the 4 o'clock position. Credit: Ryan Lambert, Franck Marchis
#PPOD: Nebula Pa 30 appears in the same sky direction now as a bright "guest star" did in the year 1181. Although Pa 30's filaments look similar to that created by a nova (for example GK Per), and a planetary nebula (for example NGC 6751), some astronomers now propose that it was created by a rare type of supernova: a thermonuclear Type Iax, and so is (also) named SN 1181. Credit: NASA, ESA, USAF, NSF
#PPOD: Taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft on September 12, 2007, this image of Saturn's outermost large moon Iapetus has been assembled from infrared, green, and ultraviolet-filtered images (IR1/GRN/UV3). The large craters Engelier and Gerin are near the top right. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Kevin M. Gill
#PPOD: This spectacular view of Gosses Bluff (known as Tnorala to the Aboriginal people), Northern Territory, Australia, was photographed from the International Space Station. About 142 million years ago in the early Cretaceous period a meteorite probably one kilometre in diameter struck in the heart of Australia, blasting a 22-kilometre-wide hole out of the earth's crust. Credit: NASA
#PPOD: This massive dust storm was captured by multiple Martian orbiters on June 1, 2022. The composite here is compiled from images taken by China's Tianwen-1 spacecraft. The storm looms near the mighty Olympus Mons (not seen in this photo).
#PPOD: Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks graces the evening sky above the summits of Kežmarský štít (8,389 ft/2,557 m), at right, and Lomnický štít (8,635 ft/2,632 m), at left in the Tatra Mountains of Slovakia. At the summit of Lomnický štít is a small domed building. This structure is the Skalnaté pleso Observatory, one of the highest astronomical observatories in central Europe. Credit: Petr Horálek - Institute of Physics in Opava (https://www.petrhoralek.com/)
#PPOD: This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows LEDA 42160, a galaxy about 52 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Virgo. The dwarf galaxy is one of many forcing its way through the comparatively dense gas in the massive Virgo cluster of galaxies. The pressure exerted by this intergalactic gas, known as ram pressure, has dramatic effects on star formation in LEDA 42160. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Sun
#PPOD: A collapsed lava tube in Hephaestus Fossae on Mars was imaged by HiRISE, the high-resolution camera onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
Note: Full high-resolution frames are usually about 1 km across; however, this image was cropped. This skylight is still probably several hundred meters across.
#PPOD: Earth hangs above a large boulder examined by Apollo 17 astronauts Gene Cernan and Jack Schmidt in December 1972. A recent analysis of freshly opened samples from Apollo 17 found that the Moon is at least 4.46 billion years old, or roughly 40 million years older than revealed by other samples. Credit: NASA
#PPOD: This is actually a mud volcano in eastern Russia, named Pugachevskiy. It is located on the Sakhalin island. The mud volcanoes are formations generated by the release of gases and liquids. The mud is pushed to the surface as the pressure builds up beneath the Earth, creating an unusual pattern. We could not find a precise measurement of its size, but judging from other photographs, it is likely around 100 m in diameter. Credit: Mikhail Mikhailov/Caters News Agency
#PPOD: What may look like a strangely nearby galaxy is actually a normal rocket's exhaust plume -- but unusually backlit. Like noctilucent clouds, the plume's brightness is caused by the Twilight Effect, where an object is high enough to be illuminated by the twilight Sun, even when the observer on the ground experiences the darkness of night. The spiral shape is caused by the Falcon rocket reorienting to release satellites in different directions. Credit: Seung Hye Yang
#PPOD: St. Patrick’s Aurora Illuminates the Night Sky
This majestic image of the dazzling green lights of the aurora borealis was captured on March 17, 2015, around 5:30 a.m. EDT in Donnelly Creek, Alaska.
#PPOD: Images from NASA's Mars Curiosity rover’s pioneering encounter with sand dunes on Mars constrain the wind speeds required to move sand in the thin Martian atmosphere. This encounter took place almost seven years ago and gave scientists important data about the ability of the Martian atmosphere to move particles. It did not hurt either that this image was just spectacular! Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
#PPOD: In 2018, super typhoon Trami wreaked havoc on Japan, as strong winds and torrential rains battered the country. In the days leading up to the incredible typhoon, there was no better view of the devastating storm than from outer space. From his perch at the International Space Station, astronaut Alexander Gerst snapped incredible photos of the typhoon a few days before it hit land. Here you can clearly see the eye!! Credit: ESA/NASA-A.Gerst
#PPOD: Located in northeastern Greenland on the Kronprins Christian Land peninsula, Elephant Foot Glacier is not connected to Greenland’s main ice sheet. Rather, it’s part of a network of glaciers and ice caps that pepper the periphery of the island. Research has shown that these outlying glaciers and ice caps account for 5 to 7 percent of Greenland’s total ice coverage but are responsible for 20 percent of its contribution to sea level rise. Credit: Kashif Pathan / Flickr
#PPOD: The Moon is seen passing in front of the Sun at the point of the maximum of the partial solar eclipse near Banner, Wyoming on Monday, Aug. 21, 2017. A total solar eclipse swept across a narrow portion of the contiguous United States from Lincoln Beach, Oregon to Charleston, South Carolina. A partial solar eclipse was visible across the entire North American continent along with parts of South America, Africa, and Europe. Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky
#PPOD: The highest peak in Japan, Mount Fuji, is one of the nation’s most striking symbols. Astronauts need oblique views and low sun angles to get a strong sense of three dimensions when they take photographs from the International Space Station. The low afternoon sun emphasizes the conical shape of the famous volcano. Other details enhance the sense of topography in the image, including numerous gullies in the flanks, as well as shadows cast in the summit- and side crater (Hoei). Credit: NASA
#PPOD: The 1.5 km wide Meridiani Planum Crater on Mars is located on the Meridiani Planum (plain), two degrees south of Mars's equator. Taken by the HiRISE camera onboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
#PPOD: Ross Stone captured this view of the Owens Valley Radio Observatory east of the Sierra Nevada, California, on January 25. Ross wrote: "The full moon setting behind the Sierra Nevada and a Caltech radio telescope." Credit: Ross Stone, via EarthSky
#PPOD: These surreal rock formations are some of New Mexico's greatest treasures. The Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness is a 45,000-acre (18,000 ha) wilderness area located in San Juan County in the U.S. state of New Mexico. Sediments that created them were deposited 75 million years ago, as the dinosaurs still roamed the Earth. Then, millions of years of erosion formed these residual formations. Credit: John Fowler via Flickr
#PPOD: The conspicuous black spot on Jupiter is Io's shadow and is about the size of the moon itself (2,262 miles or 3,640 kilometers across). This shadow sails across the face of Jupiter at 38,000 mph (17 kilometers per second). The smallest details visible on Io and Jupiter measure 93 miles (150 kilometers) across, or about the size of Connecticut. Credit: J. Spencer (Lowell Observatory) and NASA/ESA
#PPOD: This image from the Keck Observatory on Mauna Kea shows effusive (slow) volcanic eruptions and high-temperature outbursts on Jupiter’s tiny moon, Io. Details as small as 100 km (60 miles) are visible on the moon’s surface. Credit: Keck Observatory