For a little more than 25 years the Hubble space telescope has been the largest most famous observatory in space, released in the year 1990 Hubble has been sending back images that have changed the world of astronomy at large, from the jaw-dropping Lagoon Nebula to the fascinating pillars of creation Hubble for us was the closest we could get to the mysteries of our universe..until we were introduced to the James Webb telescope. Named after the former NASA Administrator, The James Webb telescope according to many astrophysicists is a hundred times more powerful than the Hubble telescope. Unlike Hubble, the Webb is primarily an infrared telescope that will enable astronomers to not only look farther out in space but also back in time. 

The Webb is expected to bring a massive revolution in the field of astronomy and many have been regarding it as a machine for answering the unanswered questions about the universe we are a part of, with its majestic gold-hued mirrors Webb will provide mankind with a way to explore the seemingly unexplorable.

The 10 billion-dollar self-deploying invention will be launched in space on the 28th of December, 2021 at a distance of more than 1.5 million km away from the Earth.

NASA Hubble captures the delicate dance between two interacting galaxies. Setting the scene at more than 100 million light-years away from Earth, the lower galaxy clearly tugs at the galaxy on the upper right, which appears to extend one spiral arm downward. The two galaxies are classified as spiral, but their shapes appear different due to their orientation in respect to Earth. Astronomers think that collisions between spiral galaxies like this can lead to the formation of another type of galaxy, known as elliptical galaxies. As extremely massive and energetic these collisions may be, it is no quickstep. Collisions like these often take place over hundreds of millions of years, so we should not expect this dancing pair to look any different during the course of our lifetimes.

Credit: NASA/ EuropeanSpaceAgency/ Hubble/ J. Dalcanton; Acknowledgment: J. Schmidt.

(Via NASA on Instagram)

Blown by the wind from a massive star, this interstellar apparition has a surprisingly familiar shape. Cataloged as NGC 7635, it is also known simply as The Bubble Nebula. Although it looks delicate, the 7 light-year diameter bubble offers evidence of violent processes at work. Above and right of the Bubble’s center is a hot, O-type star, several hundred thousand times more luminous and some 45 times more massive than the Sun. A fierce stellar wind and intense radiation from that star have blasted out the structure of glowing gas against denser material in a surrounding molecular cloud. The intriguing Bubble Nebula and associated cloud complex lie a mere 7,100 light-years away towards the constellation Cassiopeia.

Image Credit: Credit: Prabhu S Kutti (Via BAS)

Image Details:

Date:12.09.2021 & 13.09.2021, Location: Buraq. UAE(Bortle:5), S2 - 5 minutes x 18 Ha - 5 minutes x 28 O3 - 5 minutes x 19, Total integration time: 5.4 hours only at f5.3 Flats, darks 2x2 bin, Sensor temp: -5° Equipment: GSO 8" RC - TSCCD67 reducer - ZWO 294MM Pro Camera - Antlia 3nm SHO filters, 7 Position 36mm filter wheel - AZEQ6 Mount (ZWO OAG with ZWO224MC cam for guiding), Processing software: Pixinsight(Stacking, SHO Combination, DBE, MSLT, HT, pixel math, CC, CurvesT, SCNR, Deconvolution, LHE, MorphologicalT.

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One of the brightest galaxies in planet Earth's sky is similar in size to our Milky Way Galaxy: big, beautiful Messier 81. Also known as NGC 3031 or Bode's galaxy for its 18th-century discoverer, this grand spiral can be found toward the northern constellation of Ursa Major, the Great Bear. The sharp, detailed telescopic view reveals M81's bright yellow nucleus, blue spiral arms, pinkish starforming regions, and sweeping cosmic dust lanes. Some dust lanes actually run through the galactic disk (left of center), contrary to other prominent spiral features though. The errant dust lanes may be the lingering result of a close encounter between M81 and the nearby galaxy M82 lurking outside of this frame. M81's faint, dwarf irregular satellite galaxy, Holmberg IX, can be seen just below the large spiral. Scrutiny of variable stars in M81 has yielded a well-determined distance for an external galaxy -- 11.8 million light-years.

Text Source: Astronomy Picture of the Day

Aldebaran designated, α Tauri (Latinized to Alpha Tauri, abbreviated Alpha Tau, α Tau), is an orange giant star measured to be about 65 light-years from the Sun in the zodiac constellation Taurus. It is the brightest star in Taurus and generally the fourteenth-brightest star in the night sky, though it varies slowly in brightness between magnitude 0.75 and 0.95. Aldebaran is believed to host a planet several times the mass of Jupiter, named Aldebaran b.

China launched a robotic lunar mission on Monday from the Wenchangh Space Launch Center. If all goes according to plan, the mission will bring lunar samples back to Earth in mid-December.  This is the first lunar sample-return mission in over 44 years.

A new citizen science platform called Planet Patrol launched by NASA can help discover new planets beyond our own solar system. The Planet Patrol platform allows members of the public to collaborate with professional astronomers through images collected by NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS).

NASA announced that volunteers will help determine which TESS snapshots include signals from potential planets and which ones show planet impersonators. Citizen scientists can dive even deeper by learning more about the star in each image and by engaging with the Planet Patrol community.