Astronomy Picture of the Day -- Where Your Shadow Has Company

NASA ^ | February 20, 2016 | (see photo credit)

[SunkenCiv]

Explanation: Want to take a relaxing interstellar vacation? Consider visiting Kepler-16b, a world in a binary star system. In fact Kepler-16b is the first discovered circumbinary planet. It was detected in a wide 229 day orbit around a close pair of cool, low-mass stars some 200 light-years away. The parent stars eclipse one another in their orbits, observed as a dimming of starlight. But Kepler-16b itself was discovered by following the additional very slight dimming produced during its transits. Like sci-fi planet Tatooine of Star Wars fame, two suns would set over its horizon. Still, Kepler 16b is probably not a Tatooine-like terrestrial desert world. Instead, Kepler 16b is thought to be a cold, uninhabitable planet with about the mass of Saturn and a gaseous surface ... so plan to dress accordingly. Or, choose another Visions of the Future vacation destination.

[SunkenCiv]

[Poster Illustration Credit: NASA, JPL, Exoplanet Travel Bureau]

[SunkenCiv]

The Big One

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[TXnMA]

Anyone who has ever taken photos using multiple lights can tell you that the artist who painted that garbage is a dumb@$$:

The colors of the shadows are the opposite of what they should be!!!

[TheOldLady]

Thank you for the post and ping, Mr. Civilizations.

This is certainly something completely different. Amazing!