Posted on 02/18/2010 11:06:24 AM PST by Steelfish
February 18, 2010
Nasa Releases First Images From Sky-Mapping Spacecraft
(Nasa/JPL-Caltech/UCLA ) A dramatic image of a nebula containing young, massive stars was captured by Nasa's Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer Image :5 of 5 Hannah Devlin
Nasa has released the first images from its sky-mapping spacecraft, revealing a glowing comet, a star-forming cloud and a new view of our neighbouring galaxy, Andromeda.
Since launching in December, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE for short, has sent back more than 250,000 raw images. Nasa processed several of them for public viewing.
“We’ve got a candy store of images coming down from space,” the principal investigator Edward Wright, of the University of California, Los Angeles, said in a statement.
The comet, known as Siding Spring, was originally spotted by Australian astronomers but WISE picked up the best view of it on January 10 when the comet passed as close as 111.5 million miles (180 million km) to Earth.
The comet appears red on the images because it is ten times colder than surrounding stars and so gives off more light at the longer wavelengths that WISE is designed to detect.
The image of Andromeda highlights the dust that clings to Andromeda’s spiral arms, as well as two satellite galaxies, known as M32, located just a bit above Andromeda to the left of centre, and the fuzzy blue M110, located below the centre of the spiral arms. Another view of the oldest stars in Andromeda reveals a warp in the galaxy’s disk, which is the result of a collision with another galaxy long ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
Ping
Wow.
Thanks, Steelfish.
Very welcome.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.