Best Pictures of Space

Best space images of 2006, according to space.com



1. Nebulous Winds
A planetary nebula about 3,000 light years from Earth. This panel of composite images shows part of the unfolding drama of the last stages of the evolution of sun-like stars. Dynamic elongated clouds envelop bubbles of multimillion degree gas produced by high-velocity winds from dying stars. In these images, Chandra's X-ray data are shown in blue, while green and red are optical and infrared data from Hubble. This photo was released on May 10, 2006.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/RIT/J.Kastner et al.; Optical/IR: BD +30 & Hen 3: NASA/STScI/Univ. MD/J.P.Harrington; NGC 7027: NASA/STScI/Caltech/J.Westphal & W.Latter; Mz 3: NASA/STScI/Univ. Washington/B.Balick




2. In Saturn's Shadow
This marvelous panoramic view of Saturn was taken by the Cassini wide-angle camera over nearly three hours on Sept. 15, 2006. With giant Saturn hanging in the blackness and sheltering Cassini from the sun's blinding glare, the spacecraft viewed the rings as never before, revealing previously unknown faint rings and even glimpsing its home world. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute





3. Orion Nebula
NASA's Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes have teamed up to expose the chaos that baby stars are creating 1,500 light-years away in a cosmic cloud called the Orion Nebula. The Orion nebula is a canvas of colors when seen by the Hubble and Spitzer space observatories in this image and video.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/T. Megeath (University of Toledo)






4. Southern Pinwheel Galaxy
Messier 83 is a nearby galaxy located just beyond the borders of our local group of galaxies. The central bulge has the characteristic yellowish glow of old star, while the spiral arms, traced by diffuse blue light and red star formation knots, has a much younger stellar population.
Copyright Canada-France Hawaii Telescope





5. Large Magellanic Cloud
This is a composite image of N49, the brightest supernova remnant in optical light in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The Chandra X-ray image (blue) shows million-degree gas in the center. Much cooler gas at the outer parts of the remnant is seen in the infrared image from Spitzer (red). While astronomers expected that dust particles were generating most of the infrared emission, the study of this object indicates that much of the infrared is instead generated in heated gas.
X-ray: NASA/CXC/Caltech/S.Kulkarni et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI/UIUC/Y.H.Chu & R.Williams et al.; IR: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R.Gehrz et al.