NASA·每日一图

NASA’s Mars Pathfinder mission landed on the Red Planet on July 4, 1997. It’s tiny rover, named Sojourner after abolitionist Sojourner Truth, spent 83 days of a planned seven-day mission exploring the Martian terrain, acquiring images, and taking chemical, atmospheric and other measurements. When the Mars Pathfinder spacecraft approached its destination, no NASA mission had successfully reached Mars in more than 20 years.The final data transmission received from Pathfinder was at 10:23 UTC on September 27, 1997. This image shows the Twin Peaks, which are modest-size hills to the southwest of the Mars Pathfinder landing site. They were discovered on the first panoramas taken by the IMP camera on the July 4, and subsequently identified in Viking Orbiter images taken more than 20 years before….

Skylab 4 Commander Gerald P. Carr is fully suited as he prepares to enter spacecraft 118 (the Skylab 4 vehicle) at the start of a high altitude chamber test at the Kennedy Space Center in this image from Aug. 6, 1973. Also participating in the test were scientist-astronaut Edward G. Gibson, science pilot, and astronaut William R. Pogue, pilot. The Skylab 4 spacecraft was moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building on Aug. 12, where it was mated with the launch vehicle. Carr passed away on Aug. 26, 2020. “NASA and the nation have lost a pioneer of long duration spaceflight,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. Read the statement. See this TED-Ed animation, narrated by Carr, as he discussed his life as an astronaut. Image Credit:…

As the International Space Station orbited more than 200 miles above our home planet, the crew caught this glimpse of the sunrise casting long shadows over a cloudy Philippine Sea as the station orbited off the coast of the Philippines northeast of Manila. Image Credit: NASA 当国际空间站在距地球200多英里的上空飞行时，机组人员看到了日出在多云的菲律宾海面上投下长长的阴影，此时国际空间站正在菲律宾马尼拉东北的海岸上空飞行。 图片来源:美国国家航空航天局

While appearing as a delicate and light veil draped across the sky, this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope actually depicts a small section of the Cygnus supernova blast wave, located around 2,400 light-years away. The name of the supernova remnant comes from its position in the northern constellation of Cygnus (the Swan), where it covers an area 36 times larger than the full Moon. The original supernova explosion blasted apart a dying star about 20 times more massive than our Sun between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. Since then, the remnant has expanded 60 light-years from its center. The shockwave marks the outer edge of the supernova remnant and continues to expand at around 220 miles per second. The interaction of the ejected…

In this large celestial mosaic taken by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and published in 2019, there’s a lot to see, including multiple clusters of stars born from the same dense clumps of gas and dust. Some of these clusters are older than others and more evolved, making this a generational stellar portrait. This image is of the Cepheus C and Cepheus B regions and combines data from Spitzer’s IRAC and MIPS instruments. The grand green-and-orange delta filling most of the image is a faraway nebula, or a cloud of gas and dust in space. Though the cloud may appear to flow from the bright white spot at its tip, it is actually what remains of a much larger cloud that has been carved away by…

What does this Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope Spirograph have in common with Women’s Equality Day? The Fermi mission is run by Project Scientist Dr. Elizabeth Hays, one of many female scientists and leaders at NASA. Hays and her deputy, Dr. Judith Racusin, are astrophysicists in the Astrophysics Science Division of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. They provide scientific guidance and interface with scientist, engineers, and the public. Also part of the Fermi team are Mission Director Beth Pumphrey, and the Gamma-ray Burst monitor Principle Investigator, Dr. Colleen Wilson-Hodge. NASA has been at the forefront of women in STEM (science, technology engineering and math) since the agency’s beginnings. Our fiirst Chief Scientist was Dr. Nancy Grace Roman (who now has a telescope named…

Discovered in 2016, a roughly Earth-sized planet orbiting our nearest neighboring star might be habitable, according to astronomers using the European Southern Observatory’s 3.6-meter telescope at La Silla, Chile, along with other telescopes around the world. The exoplanet is at a distance from its star that allows temperatures mild enough for liquid water to pool on its surface. This artist’s impression shows a view of the surface of the planet Proxima b orbiting the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, the closest star to the solar system. The double star Alpha Centauri AB also appears in the image. Proxima b is a little more massive than the Earth and orbits in the habitable zone around Proxima Centauri, where the temperature is suitable for liquid water to…

In this image, one of the radiation detectors for the Radi-N2 experiment floats in the space station. This device will help researchers explore the radition risk to humans in space. Neutrons make up a significant part of the radiation exposure in low-Earth orbit, but have not been well characterized. Radi-N2, a Canadian Space Agency investigation, uses bubble detectors to better characterize the neutron environment on the space station, helping to define the risk it poses to crew members. It continues a previous investigation, Radi-N1, and repeats measurements in the same or equivalent locations aboard the space station. Measuring the average dose in different segments of the space station supports development of a radiation protection plan for future missions. During the week of Aug. 17, 2020,…

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope features the spectacular galaxy NGC 2442, nicknamed the Meathook galaxy owing to its extremely asymmetrical and irregular shape. This galaxy was host to a supernova explosion spotted in March 2015, known as SN 2015F, that was created by a white dwarf star. The white dwarf was part of a binary star system and siphoned mass from its companion, eventually becoming too greedy and taking on more than it could handle. This unbalanced the star and triggered runaway nuclear fusion that eventually led to an intensely violent supernova explosion. The supernova shone brightly for quite some time and was easily visible from Earth through even a small telescope until months later. Download in full resolution from ESA’s Hubble…