Spacecraft and Celestial Bodies

Artistic concepts illustrating NASA spacecraft in space, exploring brown dwarfs, Saturn, and the heliosphere's outer layers.

A New View of Saturn - Black and White

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope set its infrared eyes on an extraordinarily low-mass brown dwarf called OTS 44 and found a swirling disc of planet-building dust shown in this artist concept.

A New View of Saturn - Black and White

This artist's concept shows the outer layers of our solar bubble, or heliosphere, and nearby interstellar space. NASA's Voyager 1 is currently exploring a region of interstellar space.

This artist's concept shows NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft exploring a region called the 'depletion region' or 'magnetic highway' at the outer limits of our heliosphere, the bubble the sun blows around itself.

Altimetry Is Defining Mercury's Shape

This artist's concept puts solar system distances -- and the travels of NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft -- in perspective. The scale bar is in astronomical units, with each set distance beyond 1 AU representing 10 times the previous distance. One AU is the distance from the Sun to Earth, which is about 93 million miles, or 150 million kilometers. Neptune, the most distant planet from the Sun, is about 30 AU. Much of the solar system is actually in interstellar space. Informally, the term solar system is often used to mean the space out to the last planet. Scientific consensus, however, says the solar system goes out to the Oort Cloud, the source of the comets that swing by our sun on long time scales. Beyond the outer edge of the Oort Cloud, the gravity of other stars begins to dominate that of the Sun. The inner edge of the main part of the Oort Cloud could be as close as 1,000 AU from our Sun. The outer edge is estimated to be around 100,000 AU. Voyager 2, the second farthest human-made

NASA's Galileo spacecraft observed Io on nearly every orbit as part of a program monitoring the level of volcanic activity on this moon. Io is the most volcanically active body in the Solar System.

Astronomers watched an exoplanet called HD 80606b heat up and cool off during its sizzling-hot orbit around its star. The results are shown in this data plot from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

This thermal infrared image was acquired by NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft on October 30, 2001, as the spacecraft orbited Mars on its ninth revolution around the planet.

This graph of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows changes in the infrared light output of two star-planet systems (one above, one below) located hundreds of light-years away.

Locations of more than 1,000 craters mapped on Pluto by NASA's New Horizons mission indicate a wide range of surface ages, which likely means that Pluto has been geologically active throughout its history.

This image shows the most recent observations of the 2-mile-wide (4-kilometer-wide) comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which is the upcoming target of the European Space Agency's Rosetta mission.

Gas and Dust Jets Match Up

The top graph consists of infrared data from NASAs Spitzer Space Telescope. It tells astronomers that a distant planet, called Upsilon Andromeda b, always has a giant hot spot on the side that faces the star, while the other side is cold and dark. The artists concept above the graph illustrate how the planet might look throughout its orbit if viewed up close with infrared eyes. . The bottom graph and artists concepts represent what astronomers might have seen if the planet had bands of different temperatures girdling it, like Jupiter. Some astronomers had speculated that hot-Jupiter planets like Upsilon Andromeda b, which circle very closely around their stars, might resemble Jupiter in this way.

These three pairs of images from NASA's EPOXI mission demonstrate that a dust jet and gaseous carbon dioxide are being released from comet Hartley 2 at the same time, and from the same location on the comet.

This full-sky map from ESA's Planck mission shows matter between Earth and the edge of the observable universe. Regions with less mass show up as lighter areas while regions with more mass are darker.

Jupiter's Gossamer Ring Structure

This chart shows what types of objects WISE can and cannot see at certain distances from our sun. Bodies with larger masses are brighter, and therefore can be seen at greater distances.

This plot of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescopes shows that asteroid dust around a dead 'white dwarf' star contains silicates -- a common mineral on Earth.

This image shows the initial ejecta that resulted when NASA's Deep Impact probe collided with comet Tempel 1 at 10:52 p.m. Pacific time, July 3 (1:52 a.m. Eastern time, July 4), 2005.

This graphic shows the different streams of charged particles inside the bubble around our sun and outside, in the unexplored territory of interstellar space. The heliosheath, where NASA's two Voyager spacecraft are now traveling, is shown in red.

This plot tells astronomers that a fifth planet is in orbit around the star 55 Cancri, making the star the record-holder for hosting the most known exoplanets.

Saturn's Ring

These observations of Jupiter's equator in thermal (heat) emission were made by NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility (top panel) within hours of the Near-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (NIMS) instrument image (middle inset) and the spectra (bottom).

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has detected the building blocks of life in the distant universe, albeit in a violent milieu.

Infrared Map of Titan's Active Regions

This infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope -- called a spectrum -- tells astronomers that a distant gas planet, a so-called hot

. SWOT Measures Tuvalu Sea Level. The recently launched Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission collected data on sea levels around two of the inhabited islands of Tuvalu, a nation in the South Pacific Ocean that has been threatened with sea level rise that substantially exceeds the global average. The image shows two areas of red that indicate higher than normal sea levels around two of Tuvalu's inhabited islands, Nanumanga and Nanumea. The higher sea levels were likely caused by internal tides or circular currents called eddies. The SWOT data illuminates for the first time these small ocean features that, when they occur on top of rising sea levels, can lead to episodic flooding along coastlines. The Tuvalu data was collected March 21, 2023. Rising seas are a direct consequence of climate change. On a global scale, the combination of warming ocean waters and ice melt from glaciers and ice sheets is leading to sea level rise that is occurring at an ever-increasing rate. The

A schematic showing the layers of Enceladus: an icy crust beneath which may lie liquid water and a solid, hot core

NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft produced this high-energy neutron detector map of neutrons in Mars' southern hemisphere. The blue region around the south pole indicates a high content of hydrogen in the upper 2 to 3 meters (7 to 10 feet) of the surface.

This plot of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope tells astronomers that a toasty gas exoplanet, or a planet beyond our solar system, contains water vapor.

Gravitational microlensing, illustration

On Sept. 14, 2017, one day before making its final plunge into Saturn's atmosphere, NASA's Cassini spacecraft used its Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph, or UVIS, instrument to capture this final view of ultraviolet auroral emissions in the planet's north polar region. The view is centered on the north pole of Saturn, with lines of latitude visible for 80, 70 and 60 degrees. Lines of longitude are spaced 40 degrees apart. The planet's day side is at bottom, while the night side is at top. A sequence of images from this observation has also been assembled into a movie sequence. The last image in the movie was taken about an hour before the still image, which was the actual final UVIS auroral image. Auroral emissions are generated by charged particles traveling along the invisible lines of Saturn's magnetic field. These particles precipitate into the atmosphere, releasing light when they strike gas molecules there. Several individual auroral structures are visible here, despite that this

Scientists measure the spin rates of supermassive black holes by spreading the X-ray light into different colors. The light comes from accretion disks that swirl around black holes, as shown in both of the artist's concepts.

Dark Dry Ice on Southern Cap - Thermal Image

This frame from an animation shows Jupiter's volcanic moon Io as seen by NASA's Voyager and Galileo spacecraft (at left) and the pattern of heat flow from 242 active volcanoes (at right).

On Tuesday, August 30, 2005, NASA's Terra spacecraft retrieved cloud-top heights and cloud-tracked wind velocities for Tropical Storm Katrina, as the center of the storm was situated over the Tennessee Valley.

NASA's New Horizons spacecraft took this image of Pluto's vast nitrogen ice plain informally named Sputnik Planum.

Habitable zones around different star types, illustration

These two data plots from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope show a primitive supermassive black hole (top) compared to a typical one; usually, dust tori are missing and only gas disks are observed in primitive black holes.

Slab Ice and Snow Flurries in the Mars Northern Polar Night

This collage of NASA's Cassini spacecraft images and computer simulations shows how long, sinuous features from Enceladus can be modeled by tracing the trajectories of tiny, icy grains ejected from the moon's south polar geysers.

These four panels show the location of the newly discovered planet-like object, dubbed 'Sedna,' which lies in the farthest reaches of our solar system.

New Radiation Belt

This graph of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows how astronomers located a hot spot on a distant gas planet named upsilon Andromedae b. Termed an exoplanet, it orbits a star beyond our sun, and whips around very closely to its star.

Black holes are tremendous objects whose immense gravity can distort and twist space-time, the fabric that shapes our universe as this chart from NASA's NuSTAR and ESA's XMM-Newton telescope illustrates.

Hubble Discovery Image of New Moon Orbiting Saturn

Diagram showing interior the Moon

Matter lying between Earth and the edge of the observable universe is shown in this all-sky map from Planck, a European Space Agency mission with important NASA contributions.

This figure charts 30 hours of observations taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope of a strongly irradiated exoplanet (an planet orbiting a star beyond our own). Spitzer measured changes in the planet's heat, or infrared light.

This colorized map from NASA's Dawn mission shows the types of rocks and minerals distributed around the surface of the giant asteroid Vesta.

The surface of Hydra, Pluto's outermost small moon, is dominated by nearly pristine water ice confirming hints that scientists picked up in NASA's New Horizons images showing Hydra's highly reflective surface.

This is a Tempel 1 temperature map of the nucleus with different spatial resolutions from NASA's Deep Impact mission. The color bar in the middle gives temperature in Kelvins. The sun is to the right in all images.

Temperature Map of Io's Night Side

Mars and the Solar Wind

Astronomers were surprised to see these data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope in January 2013, showing a huge eruption of dust around a star called NGC 2547-ID8.

Dispersing Light through the Moon Mineralogy Mapper

Iapetus Temperature Map

Habitable zones, illustration

Mercury's High-Potassium Diet

This graphic highlights locations on the moon NASA considers 'lunar heritage sites' and the path NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory spacecraft will take on their final flight.

High Above Saturn's Cloud Tops

This image shows the region around the Prometheus volcano on Jupiter's moon Io. It was observed by NASA's Galileo spacecraft in 1996 as it was flying away from a close approach to Io.

Enceladus Plume

The upper panel of this figure shows small images of comet Hartley 2 taken by NASA's EPOXI mission over time. The lower panel is a graph showing the variation of total brightness, and the variation of the total amount of carbon dioxide, during the time.

The varying brightness of an exoplanet called 55 Cancri e is shown in this plot of infrared data captured by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

Infrared Movie of Saturn's North Polar Region

Lily Pad Spectra

This illustration shows 'quasi-parallel' (top) and 'quasi-perpendicular' (bottom) magnetic field conditions at a planetary bow shock. Bow shocks are shockwaves created when the solar wind blows on a planet's magnetic field.

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope snapped these images of the asteroid Vesta in preparation for the Dawn spacecraft's visit in 2011. The images show the difference in brightness and color on the asteroid's surface.

This infrared image, showing thermal radiation at a wavelength of 9.7 microns, was obtained by the Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii. The image shows the aftermath of an impactor hitting Jupiter on July 19, 2009.

Spring tides and neap tides.

Peaking into the Shadows. This image from NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft features Laxness, a crater on Mercury's northern plains named for Halldör Laxness, a twentieth-century Icelandic writer.

These images show Jupiter's moon Io obtained at different infrared wavelengths with the W. M. Keck Observatory's 10-meter Keck II telescope on Aug. 15, 2013 (a-c), and the Gemini North telescope on Aug. 29, 2013 (d).

This plot shows data from the Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment, or CIBER, rockets launched in 2010 and 2012. The experiment measures a diffuse glow of infrared light in the sky, known as the cosmic infrared background.

First Laser Altimetry for Mercury

This infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope -- called a spectrum -- tells astronomers that a distant gas planet, a so-called hot

This diagram illustrates that mature planetary systems like our own might be more common around twin, or binary, stars that are either really close together, or really far apart.

Io in Infrared with Giant Plume's New Hot Spot

This frame from an animation shows a conceptual sketch of Mercury's magnetosphere at the time of NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft's flyby.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope recently captured these infrared images of six older stars with known planets. The yellow, fuzzy blobs are stars circled by disks of dust, or 'debris disks,' like the one that surrounds our own Sun.

A Movie of Magnetometer Measurements from the Second Mercury Flyby

Cassini's Look at Water on the Moon

Mercury's Topography from the Second Flyby

First Orbital Image Planned for March 29

Enceladus: Global Patterns of Fracture (Southern Polar Projection)

A diagram of the asteroid belt with Earth-crossing asteroids labeled

Optical Coherence Topography (OCT) image, showing a macular map. On this image, the left eye to prevent glaucoma.

An Old Friend

This plot of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope indicates the presence of molecules in the planet WASP-12b -- a super-hot gas giant that orbits tightly around its star.

This figure shows the locations of the sunset and sunrise solar occultations observed by the Alice instrument on NASA's New Horizons spacecraft.

This series of images taken by NASA's New Horizons' Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC) shows how Pluto (left) and Charon (right) change in brightness as they rotate over 6.4 Earth days.

Opportunity's Trek Across the Plains of Meridiani

This plot shows that a pulsar, the remnant of a stellar explosion, is surrounded by a disk of its own ashes. The disk, revealed by the two data points at the far right from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, is the first ever found around a pulsar.

Sulfur Gas in Pele's Plume

This artist's concept shows plasma flows around NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft as it approaches interstellar space. Voyager 1's low-energy charged particle instrument detects the speed of the wind of plasma, or hot ionized gas, streaming off the sun.

This image from NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft is stitched together from thousands of observations made over the past 4 years by the MASCS/UVVS instrument, which measures sunlight scattered off of Mercury's tenuous atmosphere.

Enceladus Keeps the Home Fires Burning

On July 14, 2015, NASA's New Horizons spacecraft made its historic flight through the Pluto system. This detailed, high-quality global mosaic of Pluto was assembled from nearly all of the highest-resolution images obtained by the Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) and the Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC) on New Horizons. The mosaic is the most detailed and comprehensive global view yet of Pluto's surface using New Horizons data. It includes topography data of the hemisphere visible to New Horizons during the spacecraft's closest approach. The topography is derived from digital stereo-image mapping tools that measure the parallax -- or the difference in the apparent relative positions -- of features on the surface obtained at different viewing angles during the encounter. Scientists use these parallax displacements of high and low terrain to estimate landform heights. The global mosaic has been overlain with transparent, colorized topography data wherever on the surface

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