Monday, April 25, 2022

Finding Home
Just in case you got lost going home, here is a map! This is our island in the cosmic ocean, and we are neatly tucked in at the periphery in the Orion Spur. This map of the Milky Way Galaxy shows the constellations that cross the galactic plane in each direction and the known most prominent components annotated including main arms, spurs, bar, nucleus/bulge, and notable nebulae.

Tuesday, April 26, 2022

What Do You See?
NASA's Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using its Right Mastcam-Z in Jezero crater on Mars on April 22, 2022. Now, let us know what you see in this image!

Wednesday, April 27, 2022

Planetary Alignment
Mars, Venus, Saturn and Jupiter (and of course the Earth) as seen from Australia.

Thursday, April 28, 2022

Ingenuity Spots Percy's Stuff
This remarkable image was taken by the Ingenuity helicopter on April 20, 2022, during the latest flight, number 26. Ingenuity actually flew over the backshell and parachute that took it and the Perseverance rover safely through the martian atmosphere during their descent.

Friday, April 29, 2022

Giant Dune
An oryx and an impala meet at the foot of a gigantic dune in Namibia. Take a look at the amazing scale in this photo! Namib-Naukluft National Park in the Namib Desert is thought to be Earth’s oldest desert and has the tallest sand dunes in the world, rising up to over 300 meters in height. Their orange color is due to iron oxidization.

Bonus: Eclipsing Mars
NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover used its Mastcam-Z camera system to shoot the highest resolution video yet of Phobos, one of Mars’ two moons, transiting the Sun. It’s the most zoomed-in, highest frame-rate observation of a Phobos solar eclipse ever taken from the Martian surface.