Imagem Astronómica do Dia

The Pelican Nebula in Gas, Dust, and Stars

07/09/2026

Explicação: The Pelican Nebula is slowly being transformed. IC 5070 (an official designation) is divided from the larger North America Nebula by a molecular cloud filled with dark dust. The deep featured picture from Utah, USA incorporates 25 hours of exposure and brings out great details of this filamentary dust. The Pelican Nebula receives much study because it is a particularly active mix of star formation and evolving gas clouds. The light from young energetic stars is slowly transforming the cold gas to hot gas, with the advancing boundary between the two, known as an ionization front, visible in bright orange on the upper right. Particularly dense tentacles of cold gas remain. Millions of years from now, the Pelican Nebula, bounded by dark nebula LDN 935, might no longer be known as the Pelican, as the balance and placement of stars and gas will surely leave something that appears completely different. APOD's main NASA site is moving: From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod

Créditos: Mark Killion

Pluto in Enhanced Color

06/09/2026

Explicação: Pluto is more colorful than we can see. Color data and high-resolution images of our Solar System's most famous dwarf planet, taken by the robotic New Horizons spacecraft during its flyby in 2015 July, have been digitally combined to give an enhanced-color view of this ancient world sporting an unexpectedly young surface. The featured enhanced color image is not only esthetically pretty but scientifically useful, making surface regions of differing chemical composition visually distinct. For example, the light-colored heart-shaped Tombaugh Regio on the lower right is clearly shown here to be divisible into two regions that are geologically different, with the leftmost lobe, Sputnik Planitia, also appearing unusually smooth. After Pluto, New Horizons continued on, shooting past asteroid Arrokoth in 2019 with enough speed to escape our Solar System completely.

Chasing the Moon's Shadow

05/09/2026

Explicação: Chasing the shadow of a New Moon, NASA’s WB-57F high altitude research aircraft took to the skies off the coast of Iceland on August 12 to observe a total solar eclipse. At 50,000 feet the aircraft was piloted along the precisely determined path of totality to maximize its time in the Moon’s shadow. A suite of high-resolution cameras on board was able to record eclipse data from above the clouds, dust, and atmospheric water vapor that interfere with observations made closer to the ground. This view from the cockpit, taken from an inflight video, captures the solar corona emerging at the beginning of totality. The sky appears dark in the shadow of the Moon. Venus is shining left of center in the video frame, while Jupiter and Mercury are just visible to the right of the eclipsed Sun. But the sky is bright along the distant horizon below, beyond the reach of the Moon's shadow. APOD's main NASA site is moving: From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod

Nā ʻUhane Māhoe Huki Pū i ke Ola

04/09/2026

Explicação: Nā ʻUhane Māhoe Huki Pū i ke Ola, is the Hawaiian name given to this image of a pair of spiral galaxies locked in a mutual gravitational embrace. Some 200 million light-years distant toward the high flying constellation Pegasus their spectacular, galactic scale merger is captured in sharp detail in the image from the 8.1 meter Gemini North telescope on Maunakea, Hawai‘i. The galaxy pair, known as NGC 7253 and Arp 278, was chosen as a target, researched, and given a Hawaiian name by high school students in the joint Gemini Observatory and University of Hawaiʻi Project Hōkūlani internship program. The name translates to "The Twin Spirits Pulling Together Creating Life". That's both culturally and astronomically appropriate for galaxy collisions that trigger a cosmic maelstrom of star formation from galactic reservoirs of elemental building blocks of life. These merging galaxies are found within a region of Pegasus identified as the Hawaiian navigational constellation Ka Lupe o Kawelo. APOD's main NASA site is moving: From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod

The Eclipse and the Stork

03/09/2026

Explicação: How do animals react to a total solar eclipse? The featured image shows a stork roosting on her nest in Poland at a partial phase of the recent total solar eclipse. If you are lucky enough to experience a total eclipse somewhere quiet and close to nature, you may be able to notice unusual daytime animal behaviors. During totality, you may hear nighttime sounds like crickets and frogs and see fireflies. In the dark, most birds are quiet. Thinking that it is time to go to bed, ducks and other waterfowl prepare to sleep on one leg, with their heads turned around and their beaks tucked into their back feathers (they don't really sleep with their heads tucked under one wing). When sunlight returns at the end of totality, songbirds greet the new "morning" with their dawn songs. The crickets and frogs go quiet again. Animals and people resume their lives, only briefly disturbed by the chance alignment of our Sun and Moon. APOD's main NASA site is moving : From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod

Créditos: Włodzimierz Bubak Text: Cecilia Chirenti (NASA GSFC, UMCP, CRESST II)

Solar Eclipses and Culture

02/09/2026

Explicação: Pretend you have never heard of a solar eclipse. The Sun’s behavior has been predictable your whole life. One day, you witness the sky transform as it does in today’s spliced image spanning two hours of the August 12, 2026 solar eclipse. The Sun disappears, leaving behind a bright, empty ring. What would you think had happened? Humans have interpreted eclipses in countless ways throughout history, embedding beliefs about connection, rebirth, or danger into culture. “Eclipse” comes from the Greek word “ékleipsis” meaning “abandonment”. In ancient Greece, the solar eclipse marked the anger of the gods and the Sun abandoning humanity. To the Diné people, this celestial alignment is a time of renewal. Out of respect and to avoid the danger of sunlight, the Diné stay inside until the Sun and Moon separate. The Batammariba people of Benin and Togo believe that the Sun and Moon fight during an eclipse, so the community encourages peace among themselves. Eclipses are an example of the longstanding connection between astronomy and society. Gallery: Solar Eclipse of 2026 August 12

Créditos: Javier Castro Text: Keighley Rockcliffe (NASA GSFC, UMBC CSST, CRESST II)

A Plane Lunar Eclipse

01/09/2026

Explicação: Did you need to be on the right side of this airplane to see this eclipse? No. Lunar eclipses are routinely seen from the half of the Earth facing the Moon when the eclipse occurs, making them some of the most commonly witnessed astronomical events. You don't even need any special equipment to see one -- just your unaided eyes. Lunar eclipses are also some of the most photographed astronomical events because, unlike with a solar eclipse, your eyes and camera do not have to look toward the bright Sun. However, considering the featured image taken last week from Portugal, if you were on the left side of that airplane during takeoff, you might have trouble seeing it -- at first. But even then, after takeoff, since lunar eclipses typically last for hours, you might soon be able to safely cross the aisle(s) to see it. Gallery: Lunar Eclipse of 2026 August APOD's main NASA site is moving: From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod

Launch of the Roman Space Telescope

31/08/2026

Explicação: A new telescope has been launched into space to study the universe. The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (RST) has the same size main mirror as the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) but sees 100 times more sky during each snapshot. This is possible because when compared to HST, RST's main mirror is more curved, its secondary mirror is closer, and its main camera is larger. The result is that RST can inspect more of the sky more quickly, likely allowing, among other capabilities, the discovery of many more supernovas which tell us more about the expansion rate and composition of our universe, and many more planets orbiting other stars that tell us more about the possibilities for life elsewhere in the universe. RST will orbit the Sun, not the Earth, like the James Webb Space Telescope. The featured video shows Roman being launched yesterday from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, USA aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket. APOD's main NASA site is moving: From apod.nasa.gov to science.nasa.gov/apod