Russian Cosmonauts on Spacewalk VKD-64 | International Space Station

Russian Cosmonauts on Spacewalk VKD-64 | International Space Station

Russian Spacewalker #2, Aleksei Zubritsky in the Orlan-MKS No. 6 spacesuit with blue stripes

Station Commander and Russian Spacewalker 1, Sergei Ryzhikov, in the Orlan-MKS No. 7 spacesuit with red stripes, at work on the European Robotic Arm (ERA).

Station Commander and Russian Spacewalker 1, Sergei Ryzhikov, in the Orlan-MKS No. 7 spacesuit with red stripes at work on the European Robotic Arm (ERA).

Station Commander and Russian Spacewalker 1, Sergei Ryzhikov, in the Orlan-MKS No. 7 spacesuit with red stripes, at work on the European Robotic Arm (ERA).

Russian Spacewalker #2, Aleksei Zubritsky in the Orlan-MKS No. 6 spacesuit with blue stripes.

Station Commander and Russian Spacewalker 1, Sergei Ryzhikov, in the Orlan-MKS No. 7 spacesuit with red stripes, at work on the European Robotic Arm (ERA).

Logo of the Russian Federal Space Agency, commonly called Roscosmos.

On October 16, 2025, members of Expedition 73, Russian cosmonauts Sergei Ryzhikov and Aleksei Zubritsky began a six hour plus spacewalk on the exterior of the International Space Station's Russian segment. They installed the Ekran-M experiment for the production of semiconductors in the vacuum of space outside the Nauka module. They used the European Robotic Arm (ERA) during their work. The ERA is the first robotic arm capable of 'walking' around the ISS, moving hand-over-hand between fixed base points. The ERA consists of two limbs, each with gripper mechanisms. It also has seven motorized joints that allow for a wide range of motion. 

In addition, Ryzhikov and Zubritsky removed and discarded the High Resolution Camera (HRC) (installed in 2014) from the now defunct Canadian company UrtheCast. Finally, they cleaned Window No. 1 on the service module before returning to the airlock and closing the hatch at 02:19 Moscow Time on Oct. 17, 2025, after a 6-hour 9-minute spacewalk.

Russian Spacewalker#1 Sergei Ryzhikov, Orlan-MKS No. 7 spacesuit with red stripes

Russian Spacewalker#2 Aleksei Zubritsky, Orlan-MKS No. 6 spacesuit with blue stripes

Follow Expedition 73:
https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/

Expedition 73 Crew

Station Commander: Sergey Ryzhikov (Roscosmos)

JAXA Flight Engineer (Japan): Kimiya Yui

Roscosmos (Russia) Flight Engineers: Alexey Zubritskiy, Oleg Platonov

NASA Flight Engineers: Jonny Kim, Zena Cardman, Mike Fincke

An international partnership of space agencies provides and operates the elements of the International Space Station (ISS). The principals are the space agencies of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada.

Image Credit: Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos)

Text Credits: Katya Pavlushchenko/Anatoly Zak
Image Date: Oct. 16, 2025

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #Earth #ISS #Spacewalk #EVA #VKD64 #Cosmonauts #SergeiRyzhikov #AlekseiZubritsky #Russia #Россия #Roscosmos #Роскосмос #HumanSpaceflight #Astronauts #UnitedStates #Japan #日本 #JAXA #SpaceLaboratory #InternationalCooperation #Expedition73 #STEM #Education

Green Earth Aurora | International Space Station

Green Earth Aurora | International Space Station

NASA astronaut Don Pettit: "Green auroras stretching as far as the eye can see, almost mistakable for another planet rather than the blue Earth we call home."

Auroras happen when charged particles from the Sun interact with Earth's magnetic field, creating dazzling light shows in the sky. Auroras occurs in an upper layer of Earth’s atmosphere called the ionosphere.

This image from low-Earth orbit was captured by experienced NASA astronaut and former Expedition 71/72 flight engineer, Don Pettit. NASA astronaut Don Pettit returned to Earth on April 19, 2025, concluding a seven-month science mission aboard the International Space Station. Pettit spent 220 days in space, earning him a total of 590 days in space over the course of his four spaceflights. He orbited the Earth 3,520 times, traveling 93.3 million miles in low-Earth orbit.

Follow Expedition 73:

https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/

Expedition 73 Crew

Station Commander: Sergey Ryzhikov (Roscosmos)

JAXA Flight Engineer (Japan): Kimiya Yui

Roscosmos (Russia) Flight Engineers: Alexey Zubritskiy, Oleg Platonov

NASA Flight Engineers: Jonny Kim, Zena Cardman, Mike Fincke

An international partnership of space agencies provides and operates the elements of the International Space Station (ISS). The principals are the space agencies of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada.

Image Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center/D. Pettit
Release Date: Oct. 18, 2025

#NASA #Space #ISS #Science #Sun #Planets #Earth #Atmosphere #Aurora #Astronauts #DonPettit #AstronautPhotography #UnitedStates #Japan #JAXA #Cosmonauts #Russia #Roscosmos #HumanSpaceflight #SpaceLaboratory #InternationalCooperation #Expedition71 #Expedition72 #STEM #Education

SpaceX Starship Suborbital Ascent, Booster Separation & Reentry | 11th Flight Test | Starbase Texas

SpaceX Starship Suborbital Ascent, Booster Separation & Reentry | 11th Flight Test

Super Heavy hot-staging and boostback burn

Starship ascends

Super Heavy hot-staging and boostback burn

Starship ascends

Starship ascends

Starship reenters Earth’s atmosphere on Flight 11. Data gathered from this flight will inform future Starship missions that will return to the launch site for catch and reuse.

Starship reenters Earth’s atmosphere

Starship reenters Earth’s atmosphere

A SpaceX Starship lifted off at 6:23 p.m. Central Time (CT) October 13, 2025, on the eleventh flight test. In these images, you can view Starship's ascent and Earth atmospheric reentry during its suborbital flight, including the Super Heavy booster's separation from Starship and its hot-staging and boostback burn.

Watch the full Starship 11th Test Flight here:

https://t.co/YmvmGZTV8o

"This was the final flight of the second-generation Starship and first generation Super Heavy booster, as well as the final launch from the current configuration of Pad 1. Every major objective of the flight test was achieved, providing valuable data as we prepare the next generation of Starship and Super Heavy."

"Starship re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere and was able to gather extensive data on the performance of its heatshield as it was intentionally stressed to test the limits of the vehicle’s capabilities. In the final minutes of flight, Starship performed a dynamic banking maneuver to mimic the trajectory that future missions returning to Starbase will fly. Starship then guided itself using its four flaps to the pre-planned splashdown zone in the Indian Ocean, successfully executing a landing flip, landing burn, and soft splashdown."

"Focus now turns to the next generation of Starship and Super Heavy with multiple vehicles currently in active build and preparing for tests. This next iteration will be used for the first Starship orbital flights, operational payload missions, propellant transfer, and more as we iterate to a fully and rapidly reusable vehicle with service to Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars, and beyond."

SpaceX’s Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket—collectively referred to as Starship—represent a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry crew and cargo to Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars and beyond. Starship is currently the "world’s most powerful launch vehicle ever developed", capable of carrying up to 150 metric tonnes fully reusable and 250 metric tonnes expendable.

Key Starship Parameters:

Height: 123m/403ft
Diameter: 9m/29.5ft
Payload to LEO: 100–150t (fully reusable)

"Starship is essential to both SpaceX’s plans to deploy its next-generation Starship system as well as for NASA, which will use a lunar lander version of Starship for landing astronauts on the Moon during the Artemis III mission through the Human Landing System (HLS) program."

Learn more about Starship:

https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/starship/

Download the Free Starship User Guide (PDF):

https://www.spacex.com/media/starship_users_guide_v1.pdf

Credit: Space Exploration Technologies Corporation (SpaceX)

Date: Oct. 13, 2025

#NASA #SpaceX #Space #Earth #Mars #Moon #MoonToMars #ArtemisProgram #ArtemisIII #Starship #StarshipSpacecraft #Starship11 #StarshipTestFlight11 #SuperHeavyBooster #SuperHeavyRocket #ElonMusk #Engineering #SpaceTechnology #HumanSpaceflight #CommercialSpace #SpaceExploration #StarbaseTexas #Texas #UnitedStates #STEM #Education

New Spectrum of The Massive Erupting Star Eta Carinae

New Spectrum of Massive Erupting Star Eta Carinae | SOAR Telescope

A star's spectrum provides crucial information about its mass, temperature, luminosity, radius, and chemical composition. It is primarily composed of thermal radiation, producing a continuous spectrum that emits light across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, from gamma rays to radio waves. The spectrum can also reveal details, such as rotational velocity, surface expansion or contraction, and the presence of stellar winds. The absorption spectrum of stars consists of various wavelengths, each with distinct intensities. They can help us to understand their physical properties.

This image shows the giant star-forming region in the southern sky known as the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372), and the full spectrum of the binary star system at its center—Eta Carinae. 

This spectrum was captured with the newly installed SOAR Telescope Echelle Spectrograph (STELES) on the SOAR Telescope. It measures light from around 312 nanometers to around 905 nanometers. Light that is ‘bluer’ than 380 nanometers is ultraviolet and is invisible to our eyes. Light that is ‘redder’ than around 750 nanometers is infrared and is also invisible to our eyes. The bright bands indicate the detection of specific wavelengths of light emitted by hydrogen.

Eta Carinae is a fascinating and faint pair of stars located in the constellation Carina, and is a prime example of the type of object that STELES will investigate. SOAR is located on Cerro Pachón in Chile and is operated by U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), a Program of NSF NOIRLab.

AG Carinae (AG Car) is a star in the constellation of Carina. It is classified as a luminous blue variable (LBV). The great distance (20,000 light-years) and intervening dust mean that the star is not usually visible to the naked eye; its apparent brightness varies erratically between magnitude 5.7 and 9.0.

SOAR Telescope
https://noirlab.edu/public/programs/ctio/soar-telescope/

Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/SOAR/NSF/AURA/N. Smith (University of Minnesota)
Release Date: Sept. 26, 2025

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #Stars #StellarSpectra #AGCarinae #AGCar #NGC3372 #Carina #Constellations #Astrophysics #Cosmos #Universe #SOARTelescope #CerroPachón #Chile #CTIO #NOIRLab #NSF #AURA #UnitedStates #Infographics #STEM #Education

Bright Star Eta Carinae and The Carina Nebula | Curtis Schmidt Telescope

Bright Star Eta Carinae and The Carina Nebula | Curtis Schmidt Telescope

This image shows a giant star-forming region in the southern sky known as the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372), combining light from 3 filters tracing emissions from oxygen (blue), hydrogen (green), and sulfur (red). The color is also representative of the temperature in the ionized gas: blue is relatively hot and red is cooler. 

The Carina Nebula is a good example of how very massive stars rip apart the molecular clouds that give birth to them. The bright star near the center of the image is Eta Carinae. It is one of the most massive and luminous stars known. This picture is a composite of several exposures made with the Curtis Schmidt Telescope at the Cerro Tololo Interamerican Observatory. 

AG Carinae (AG Car) is a star in the constellation of Carina. It is classified as a luminous blue variable (LBV). The great distance (20,000 light-years) and intervening dust mean that the star is not usually visible to the naked eye; its apparent brightness varies erratically between magnitude 5.7 and 9.0.

Curtis Schmidt Telescope

https://noirlab.edu/public/programs/ctio/curtis-schmidt-telescope/

Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/N. Smith (University of Minnesota)
Release Date: June 30, 2020

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #Nebulae #CarinaNebula #Stars #AGCarinae #AGCar #NGC3372 #Carina #Constellations #Astrophysics #Cosmos #Universe #SchmidtTelescope #CerroPachón #Chile #CTIO #NOIRLab #NSF #AURA #UnitedStates #STEM #Education

Flight to Great Eruption of Massive Star AG Carinae | STScI

Flight to Great Eruption of Massive Star AG Carinae | STScI

This visualization starts with the Hubble Space Telescope view of the massive star, AG Carinae. One of the brightest stars in our galaxy, AG Carinae undergoes eruptions that have ejected a small nebula of gas and dust. The sequence flies into a 3D model that shows the structure of the surrounding nebula. The 3D model is based upon Hubble images and spectroscopic data of the nebula's motion. The emission from ionized gas glows red, while the dust reflects the light of the star and appears bluish-white.

AG Carinae (AG Car) is a star in the constellation of Carina. It is classified as a luminous blue variable (LBV). The great distance (20,000 light-years) and intervening dust mean that the star is not usually visible to the naked eye; its apparent brightness varies erratically between magnitude 5.7 and 9.0.

Video Credit: Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI)

Visualization:  NASA, ESA, STScI, L. Hustak, F. Summers, A. Pagan, J. DePasquale, and G. Bacon (STScI)
Duration: 30 seconds
Release Date: Oct. 16, 2025

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #Hubble #Stars #AGCarinae #AGCar #Carina #Constellations #Astrophysics #Cosmos #Universe #HubbleSpaceTelescope #HST #SpaceTelescopes #FrankSummers #GSFC #STScI #UnitedStates #ESA #Europe #STEM #Education #AstroViz #Visualizations #3D #HD #Video

China's LandSpace Transports ZhuQue-3 Y1 Commercial Rocket to Launchpad

China's LandSpace Transports ZhuQue-3 Y1 Commercial Rocket to Launchpad

"Land to Infinity (极限征途)"
Launch preparations for Landspace's new ZhuQue-3 (ZQ-3) Y1 liquid-fueled reusable rocket are progressing steadily as planned. The launch vehicle has been successfully transported over 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) from Landspace's Jiaxing manufacturing facility in China's eastern coastal province of Zhejiang to the Dongfeng Commercial Space Innovation Zone near the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC) in northwestern China.

"Across the dusty land, with stars and dawns—the journey of a rocket that never stops . . ."

穿越风尘与黎明，往返星辰与大地

China's independently developed Zhuque-3 reusable commercial rocket has completed ground tests on its systems and will take its maiden flight in the fourth quarter of the year, aiming to become the country's first vertically reusable liquid-fueled rocket, according to the rocket's developer LandSpace.

With a diameter of 4.5 meters and a total length of around 66 meters, the Zhuque-3 rocket can carry up to 18 satellites per launch.

Equipped with landing legs and grid fins for controlled descent, the rocket is designed to vertically recover its most expensive component–the first stage. This accounts for 70 percent of the total rocket cost.

As its first stage is designed to be reused at least 20 times, the rocket has the potential to reduce launch costs by 80 to 90 percent compared with single-use rockets.

Powered by a parallel cluster of nine liquid oxygen-methane engines, the first-stage can achieve meter-level landing precision, since five of the engines are capable of gimballing.

In addition, these engines produce a combined thrust of more than 7,500 kilonewtons, setting a new record for Chinese commercial liquid-fueled rockets.

On, June 20, 2025, LandSpace conducted a crucial ground ignition test of the first-stage propulsion system at the Dongfeng commercial space innovation zone near the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China.

The 45-second test utilized a first-stage structure that is consistent with the technical status of the Zhuque-3's maiden flight mission and validated the compatibility among all major subsystems, according to LandSpace.

Beijing-based LandSpace is a leading Chinese private space company. With its Zhuque-2 rocket, LandSpace became the world's first company to launch a methane-liquid oxygen rocket to Earth orbit in July 2023, ahead of U.S. rivals, including Elon Musk's SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin.

The successful Zhuque-3 development marks a significant stride in the pursuit of low-cost, high-frequency, and large-capacity space launches for China's private space industry.

The Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC) was founded in 1958. It was the first of China's four spaceports. The launch center has been the focus of many of China's historic space ventures, including the country's first satellite Dong Fang Hong I in 1970 and their first crewed space mission, Shenzhou V, on October 15, 2003. JSLC is now a home for many new Chinese commercial space launch firms, like Landspace.

Credit: LandSpace

Duration: 2 minutes, 27 seconds
Release Date: Oct. 17, 2025

#NASA #Space #Satellites #Earth #LEO #China #中国 #LandSpace #蓝箭 #Zhuque3Rocket #Zhuque3 #ReusableRockets #LaunchVehicles #MethaneLiquidOxygen #Methalox #Jiaxing #嘉兴市 #Zhejiang #浙江 #JiuquanSatelliteLaunchCenter #JSLC #酒泉卫星发射中心 #InnerMongolia #CommercialSpace #CommercialSpaceflight #STEM #Education #HD #Video

The Shapley Supercluster in Centaurus | Hubble Space Telescope

The Shapley Supercluster in Centaurus | Hubble Space Telescope

The Shapley Supercluster or Shapley Concentration (SCl 124) is one of the largest concentration of galaxies in the Universe. It forms a gravitationally interacting unit, pulling itself together instead of expanding with the rest of the Universe. It appears as a striking overdensity in the distribution of galaxies in the constellation of Centaurus. It is 650 million light-years from Earth.

Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
Image Processing: Judy Schmidt
Release Date: Feb. 5, 2018

#NASA #ESA #Hubble #Astronomy #Space #Science #Galaxies #ShapleySupercluster #SCl124  #ShapleyConcentration #Centaurus #Constellations #Cosmos #Universe #HubbleSpaceTelescope #HST #GSFC #STScI #JudySchmidt #CitizenScience #UnitedStates #Europe #STEM #Education

Journey to The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

Journey to The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

This zoom takes the viewer from a wide view of the central parts of the Milky Way deep into a detailed picture of the Messier 8 star formation region—the Lagoon Nebula—from the VLT Survey Telescope at ESO's Paranal Observatory in Chile. This giant cloud of gas and dust is creating intensely bright young stars, and is home to young stellar clusters. Commonly known as the Lagoon Nebula, Messier 8 (M8) was discovered in 1654 by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Hodierna. He, like Charles Messier, sought to catalog nebulous objects in the night sky so they would not be mistaken for comets. This star-forming cloud of interstellar gas is located in the constellation Sagittarius, and its apparent magnitude of 6 makes it faintly visible to the unaided eye in dark skies, and easily seen with binoculars or small telescopes. The best time to observe M8 is during August.

Located 5,200 light-years from Earth, M8 is home to its own star cluster: NGC 6530 (not visible in the image above). The massive stars embedded within the nebula give off enormous amounts of ultraviolet radiation, ionizing the gas and causing it to shine.

Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ team

Duration: 50 seconds
Release Date: Jan. 22, 2014

#NASA #ESO #Astronomy #Space #Science #Nebulae #LagoonNebula #NGC6523 #Messier8 #M8 #HourglassNebula #Sagittarius #Constellations #MilkyWayGalaxy #Cosmos #Universe #VST #ParanalObservatory #Chile #SouthAmerica #Europe #STEM #Education #HD #Video

Scenes of The Lagoon Nebula | European Southern Observatory

Scenes of The Lagoon Nebula | European Southern Observatory

These excerpts are small sections from a new VLT Survey Telescope (VST) image of the Lagoon Nebula. This giant cloud of gas and dust is creating intensely bright young stars, and is home to young stellar clusters. Commonly known as the Lagoon Nebula, Messier 8 (M8) was discovered in 1654 by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Hodierna. He, like Charles Messier, sought to catalog nebulous objects in the night sky so they would not be mistaken for comets. This star-forming cloud of interstellar gas is located in the constellation Sagittarius, and its apparent magnitude of 6 makes it faintly visible to the unaided eye in dark skies, and easily seen with binoculars or small telescopes. The best time to observe M8 is during August.

Located 5,200 light-years from Earth, M8 is home to its own star cluster: NGC 6530 (not visible in the image above). The massive stars embedded within the nebula give off enormous amounts of ultraviolet radiation, ionizing the gas and causing it to shine.

Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ team
Release Date: Jan. 22, 2014

#NASA #ESO #Astronomy #Space #Science #Nebulae #LagoonNebula #NGC6523 #Messier8 #M8 #HourglassNebula #Sagittarius #Constellations #MilkyWayGalaxy #Cosmos #Universe #VST #ParanalObservatory #Chile #SouthAmerica #Europe #STEM #Education

Close-up: The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

Close-up: The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

The VLT Survey Telescope (VST) at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile captured this richly detailed image of the Lagoon Nebula. This giant cloud of gas and dust is creating intensely bright young stars, and is home to young stellar clusters. Commonly known as the Lagoon Nebula, Messier 8 (M8) was discovered in 1654 by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Hodierna. He, like Charles Messier, sought to catalog nebulous objects in the night sky so they would not be mistaken for comets. This star-forming cloud of interstellar gas is located in the constellation Sagittarius, and its apparent magnitude of 6 makes it faintly visible to the unaided eye in dark skies, and easily seen with binoculars or small telescopes. The best time to observe M8 is during August.

Located 5,200 light-years from Earth, M8 is home to its own star cluster: NGC 6530 (not visible in the image above). The massive stars embedded within the nebula give off enormous amounts of ultraviolet radiation, ionizing the gas and causing it to shine.

Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ team

Duration: 1 minutes, 36 seconds
Release Date: Jan. 22, 2014

#NASA #ESO #Astronomy #Space #Science #Nebulae #LagoonNebula #NGC6523 #Messier8 #M8 #HourglassNebula #Sagittarius #Constellations #MilkyWayGalaxy #Cosmos #Universe #VST #ParanalObservatory #Chile #SouthAmerica #Europe #STEM #Education #HD #Video

The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius | European Southern Observatory

The VLT Survey Telescope (VST) at the European Southern Observatory's Paranal Observatory in Chile captured this richly detailed image of the Lagoon Nebula. This giant cloud of gas and dust is creating intensely bright young stars, and is home to young stellar clusters. Commonly known as the Lagoon Nebula, Messier 8 (M8) was discovered in 1654 by the Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Hodierna. He, like Charles Messier, sought to catalog nebulous objects in the night sky so they would not be mistaken for comets. This star-forming cloud of interstellar gas is located in the constellation Sagittarius, and its apparent magnitude of 6 makes it faintly visible to the unaided eye in dark skies, and easily seen with binoculars or small telescopes. The best time to observe M8 is during August.

Located 5,200 light-years from Earth, M8 is home to its own star cluster: NGC 6530 (not visible in the image above). The massive stars embedded within the nebula give off enormous amounts of ultraviolet radiation, ionizing the gas and causing it to shine.

Credit: ESO/VPHAS+ team
Release Date: Jan. 22, 2014

#NASA #ESO #Astronomy #Space #Science #Nebulae #LagoonNebula #NGC6523 #Messier8 #M8 #HourglassNebula #Sagittarius #Constellations #MilkyWayGalaxy #Cosmos #Universe #VST #ParanalObservatory #Chile #SouthAmerica #Europe #STEM #Education

Zodiacal Light above The Pacific Ocean | Earth Science

Zodiacal Light above The Pacific Ocean | Earth Science

The Zodiacal light above the Pacific Ocean from the Atacama Desert in Chile.🤩 

What's that strange light? 

Dust orbiting the Sun. At certain times of the year, a band of sun-reflecting dust from the inner Solar System appears prominently just after sunset—or just before sunrise—and is called zodiacal light. Although the origin of this dust is still being researched, a leading hypothesis holds that zodiacal dust originates mostly from faint Jupiter-family comets and that it slowly spirals into the Sun.

Image Credit: Yuri Beletsky
Yuri's Website: https://t.co/R7LL6StS9N
Release Date: Oct. 15, 2025

#NASA #Astronomy #Space #Science #Stars #Sun #Planets #Earth #PacificOcean #Chile #Sunlight #CosmicDust #ZodiacalLight #SolarSystem #DarkSkies #LightPollution #Astrophotographer #YuriBeletsky #Astrophotography #STEM #Education

The Milky Way Galaxy with Zodiacal Light & Aurora | International Space Station

The Milky Way Galaxy with Zodiacal Light & Aurora | International Space Station

Zodiacal light right after orbital sunset and The Milky Way galaxy.  

The Milky Way Galaxy and Earth airglow. Green and yellow airglow occurs when atoms and molecules in the Earth's upper atmosphere, excited by sunlight, emit light to shed their excess energy. Or, it can happen when atoms and molecules that have been ionized by sunlight collide with and capture a free electron. In both cases, they eject a particle of light—called a photon—in order to relax again. Unlike episodic and fleeting auroras, airglow shines constantly throughout Earth’s atmosphere, and the result is a tenuous bubble of light that closely encases our entire planet.

The Milky Way Galaxy and Earth airglow during orbital sunset.

The Milky Way Galaxy and Earth airglow.

Stars and Earth aurora

These images were captured by Expedition 73 flight engineer and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Kimiya Yui aboard the International Space Station. 

At certain times of the year, a band of sun-reflecting dust from the inner Solar System appears prominently just after sunset—or just before sunrise—and is called zodiacal light. Although the origin of this dust is still being researched, a leading hypothesis holds that zodiacal dust originates mostly from faint Jupiter-family comets and that it slowly spirals into the Sun.

Auroras are produced when the Earth's magnetosphere is sufficiently disturbed by the solar wind that the trajectories of charged particles in solar wind and magnetospheric plasma, mainly in the form of electrons and protons, precipitate them into the upper atmosphere (thermosphere/exosphere) due to Earth's magnetic field, where their energy is lost. The resulting ionization and excitation of atmospheric constituents emits light of varying color and complexity.

Follow Expedition 73:
https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/

Expedition 73 Crew

Station Commander: Sergey Ryzhikov (Roscosmos)

JAXA Flight Engineer (Japan): Kimiya Yui

Roscosmos (Russia) Flight Engineers: Alexey Zubritskiy, Oleg Platonov

NASA Flight Engineers: Jonny Kim, Zena Cardman, Mike Fincke

An international partnership of space agencies provides and operates the elements of the International Space Station (ISS). The principals are the space agencies of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, and Canada.

Image Credit: Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)/Kimiya Yui
Release Dates: Oct. 13 & 16, 2025

#NASA #Space #Astronomy #Science #ISS #MilkyWayGalaxy #SolarSystem #Earth #ZodiacalLight #Aurora #AstronautPhotography #Astronauts #KimiyaYui #油井亀美也 #Japan #日本 #JAXA #宇宙航空研究開発機構 #UnitedStates #Cosmonauts #Russia #Roscosmos #HumanSpaceflight #SpaceLaboratory #InternationalCooperation #Expedition73 #STEM #Education

Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon): New View from Georgia, USA

Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon): New View from Georgia, USA

Astrophotographer Greg: "Even with the Moon in sight this comet is proving to be a wonderful gift to image! Taken around 6:30am EST."

Comet Lemmon is brightening and moving into morning northern skies. Besides Comet SWAN25B and Comet ATLAS, Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon) is now the third comet currently visible with binoculars and on long camera exposures. Comet Lemmon was discovered early this year and is still headed into the inner Solar System. The comet will round the Sun on November 8, but first it will pass its nearest to the Earth—at about half the Earth-Sun distance—on October 21. 

Although the brightnesses of comets are notoriously hard to predict, optimistic estimates have Comet Lemmon then becoming visible to the unaided eye. The comet should be best seen in predawn skies until mid-October, when it also becomes visible in evening skies.

Georgia is a state in the Southeastern United States. It borders Tennessee to the northwest, North Carolina and South Carolina to the northeast, Atlantic Ocean to the east, Florida to the south, and Alabama to the west.

Image Credit: Greg 
Capture Location: Georgia, United States
Photographer's website: https://Ournightsky.us
Image Date: Oct. 13, 2025

#NASA #Astronomy #Space #Science #Comets #CometC2025A6Lemmon #Coma #CometaryTails #SolarSystem #MilkyWayGalaxy #Cosmos #Universe #Astrophotography #Greg #OurNighSkyUS #Astrophotographers #Georgia #UnitedStates #STEM #Education

The Moon's Aristarchus Crater: Central Peak | NASA Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

The Moon's Aristarchus Crater: Central Peak | NASA Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

Central peak of Aristarchus Crater on Moon's near side

Aristarchus Crater on Moon's near side (wide view)

Deeper than the Earth's Grand Canyon, Aristarchus is a lunar impact crater that lies in the northwest part of the Moon's near side. It is considered the brightest of the large formations on the lunar surface with an albedo nearly double that of most lunar features. The feature is bright enough to be visible to the naked eye, and displays unusually bright features when viewed through a large telescope. It is also readily identified when most of the lunar surface is illuminated by earthshine.

The dark rim of Aristarchus crater (23.7°N, 312.5°E) dramatically highlights its bright interior and central peak. There are more than 2700 meters of relief from the rim to the crater floor, and the central peak is 3,000 meters wide (left-to-right) and 400 meters tall. Image acquired from an altitude of 96 kilometers looking east-to-west, 12 kilometers wide in the center, 

Albedo (brightness) differences on the Moon are predominantly due to varying abundances of iron and titanium, and space weathering processes. Other physical properties of the rock also have important effects on albedo, such as whether it is crystalline or glass. Glass forms when molten rock cools so rapidly (quenches) that it does not have time to crystallize into minerals. Such rapid cooling is common in explosive volcanic eruptions and impact events. Around and in Aristarchus crater, both of these processes are important.

Adjacent to Aristarchus crater is the Aristarchus plateau, one of the largest volcanic centers on the Moon. Here we find one of the largest rilles, a massive pyroclastic deposit, and the source of extensive flood basalts. These volcanic materials are considered relatively young (for the Moon)—1.5 to 2.5 billion years. The pyroclastic deposit formed when magma was explosively ejected from the vent and broke into small droplets quenched as glass in the cold vacuum of space as they fell back to the surface. Due to their high glass content, the pyroclastic deposits are distinctly low in albedo (relatively dark), providing a dark background for the bright Aristarchus crater. Within the crater, a portion of these pyroclastic deposits may be visible as the darkest areas on the far wall, and glassy impact melt is moderately lower in reflectance than the bright, rocky materials exposed on areas of the crater floor and walls. 

The Grand Canyon is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in Arizona, United States. The Grand Canyon is 277 miles (446 km) long, up to 18 miles (29 km) wide and attains a depth of over a mile (6,093 feet or 1,857 meters).

Image Credit: NASA/GSFC/LROC/School of Earth and Space Exploration, Arizona State University
Image ID: NAC M1259171271LR
Text Credit: Mark Robinson
Release Date: Dec. 1, 2022

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