Today marks the autumnal equinox, the astronomical date when fall begins and summer ends. It's a special date for keen skywatchers, including Luca Vanzella and Alister Ling who recently completed an ambitious photographic project charting the swing of the Sun and the Moon over one year.
Jeff Bezos showed off a new free-flying camera deployed from Blue Origin's New Shepard launch, which gives a spectacular view of the rocket high above Earth.
Astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy used a specially designed solar telescope attached to an astronomy camera to capture a unique image of a SpaceX rocket blasting off into orbit in front of the Sun.
An unexpectedly strong geomagnetic storm triggered aurora lights in skies across the US last night, seen as far south as Arizona.
A SpaceX Starlink satellite was recently photographed passing over China’s secretive Dingxin Airbase, appearing in an image captured by a commercial Earth-observation satellite.
The Royal Observatory Greenwich's ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year 17 contest showcases the best astronomical and night sky images of the year, captured by exceptional photographers worldwide. This year's winning photos include spectacular shots of distant galaxies, unique images of the Sun, magical nightscapes on Earth, and much more.
NASA’s Perseverance rover has taken high-resolution images of unusual rocks on Mars that could represent the strongest evidence yet of possible ancient life.
With the upcoming blood moon eclipse this weekend, astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy has revealed a unique image he took during the last total lunar eclipse earlier this year.
The latest James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) image delivers a "glittering glimpse of starbirth," the European Space Agency explains.
NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover has been exploring Jezero Crater on Mars since it landed on the planet on February 18, 2021. Since then, it has made many remarkable discoveries and captured hundreds of thousands of incredible photos. A recent photo shows a close-up of a Martian rock, it looks a lot like a turtle.
A few weeks after the Hubble Space Telescope captured an incredible photo of comet 3I/ATLAS as it screamed through the solar system at a blistering 130,000 miles per hour (209,000 kilometers per hour), the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph (GMOS) on Gemini South in Chile set its sights on the comet, capturing a gorgeous, colorful photo unlike anything seen before.
The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) peered at the Butterfly Nebula using its Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) camera, uncovering never-before-seen details of the nebula's heart. This is the first time scientists have seen the super-hot star powering the beautiful, bug-like nebula.
Studying the Sun is crucial for monitoring space weather, as events like coronal mass ejections (CMEs) can disrupt satellites, power grids, and GPS navigation. And yet this scientific research can create beautiful art.
A fake video showing the "night sky on Mars" allegedly filmed by NASA's Curiosity Rover has fooled thousands on TikTok and even a couple of news websites.
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) recorded an incredible solar prominence eruption yesterday, and experts are calling the event one of the best, most spectacular events of the current solar cycle.
A camera attached to the International Space Station (ISS) has captured a frightening view of Hurricane Erin, which meteorologists fear will bring life-threatening storm surges to the United States this week.
An extremely bright meteor lit up the night sky over Japan on Tuesday night. It could be seen from hundreds of miles away.
A team of scientists led by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) discovered a new moon orbiting the ice giant planet, Uranus, using the James Webb Space Telescope.
DarkSky International announced the winners of its fifth annual Capture the Dark photography contest. Winners across eight main categories showcase the best in astrophotography and demonstrate why it is vital to protect dark skies worldwide.
Clear days on Mars don’t come around often. Most of the time a steady haze of dust hangs in the air, giving the Red Planet its signature rusty glow.
A meteorite that was captured on video in broad daylight and that punctured a homeowner's roof is thought to be 4.56 billion years old -- older than Earth itself.
Astronomers used NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to capture the sharpest-ever photo of the comet 3I/ATLAS as it flew through the solar system at 130,000 miles per hour (209,000 kilometers per hour).
NASA’s Curiosity rover has captured photographs of a rock on Mars that closely resembles coral found on Earth.
Insta360 announced the X5 Satin White Limited Edition 360-degree camera, a sleek new design for its flagship camera. To mark the occasion and test new accompanying neutral density (ND) filters, Insta360 promptly launched its white X5 camera into the upper stratosphere, nearly 25 miles above Earth's surface.
The Hubble Ultra Deep Field is one of the most iconic space photos of all time, showing nearly 10,000 galaxies of diverse ages, sizes, shapes, and colors in a single frame. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) revisited the same region of the sky, capturing its longest exposure of an extragalactic field with a single filter yet and revealing one of the deepest views ever of the ancient Universe.
The James Webb Space Telescope's (JWST) newest images offer a dazzling preview of the Sun's eventual fate.
NASA just released a jaw-dropping collection of nine new images captured by its flagship X-ray telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory. The Universe looks wild in X-ray light, and scientists can study many fascinating cosmic phenomena in X-rays that are impossible to see across other wavelengths, including visible and ultraviolet light.
Floating 258 miles above, NASA astronauts on board the International Space Station have a view like no other and can therefore photograph Earth in unique ways.
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and Chandra X-Ray Observatory may be relatively old space observatories, but that doesn't stop them from making groundbreaking cosmological discoveries. The two telescopes just spotted an extremely rare type of black hole currently eating a star in space.
An amateur astrophotographer captured a remarkable shot showing the International Space Station (ISS) and Saturn in the same frame.
The Juno probe has been capturing spectacular images of Jupiter since 2016. However, it recently encountered problems that required NASA to perform a camera repair on JunoCam from 370 million miles away.
An international team of astronomers captured direct evidence of the filaments that weave an interconnected web throughout the cosmos.
Astronomers have captured remarkable images that may show, for the first time, a distant new planet being born.
A massive filament of plasma was explosively ejected from the Sun's surface on July 15, leaving behind a "canyon of fire" on the Sun's surface that spans 250,000 miles (over 402,000 kilometers).
It has been a decade since NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft made its historic flyby of Pluto, delivering humanity’s first close-up look at the solar system's distant dwarf planet.
Tennessee-based astrophotographer Jeffrey Horne is an exceptionally talented photographer, capturing photos of deep space that expertly blend science and art. Horne's latest image of the Spaghetti Nebula (Simeis 147) combines 569 hours of exposure time captured over the past three winters. Few photographic genres test a photographer's patience quite like astrophotography.
The International Space Station may orbit the Earth 250 miles above, making it difficult to distinguish in the sky, but one photographer has proven that with the right gear, it is possible to get a good view of it.
A group of astrophotographers has created the world's largest remote observatory, Starfront Observatories, enabling fellow photographers to photograph the cosmos under remarkably dark, clear skies in rural Texas from anywhere in the world.
NASA's Parker Solar Probe performed the closest-ever pass by the Sun late last year, and NASA has just released the remarkable images from the historic fly-by.
Awe-inspiring scenes of the Milky Way, dancing aurorae, and serene galaxies all feature on the shortlist for this year’s ZWO Astronomy Photographer of the Year.
NASA astronaut Nichole 'Vapor' Ayers captured a spectacular image of a sprite, a rare form of lightning that shoots up from a thunderstorm.
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Chandra X-ray Observatory combined their efforts to look at the Bullet Cluster in a new way, enabling scientists to precisely map the cluster's dark matter.
The James Webb Space Telescope's (JWST) latest target is Messier 82 (M82), also known as the Cigar Galaxy. The nearby galaxy is five times more luminous than the Milky Way. It has previously been photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope, providing a great way to measure the two active space telescopes against each other.
Astrophotographers are a passionate bunch, and they now have a new dedicated social media and web platform to share their work, find inspiration, and learn how to improve their craft. Picastro is all about showcasing genuine astronomy images from astrophotographers worldwide, whether they are beginners or seasoned pros.
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has captured what scientists believe is its first photograph of an exoplanet. If the findings are confirmed, it would mark the first time Webb discovered a planet through a direct image and the lightest planet ever seen using this imaging technique outside the solar system.
An astrophotographer has been capturing spectacular images of solar eclipses taking place on Saturn -- capturing Titan's shadow on the surface of the planet.
The Landsat 7 satellite has signed off on its 25 years of taking photos of Earth with one last image of Las Vegas showing that the City of Sin has almost doubled in size since the spacecraft first snapped it 25 years ago. Since its launch on April 15, 1999, Landsat 7 has captured over 3.3 million images, including the first image of Las Vegas, which was captured in July 1999.
Swedish photographer and amateur astronomer Peter Rosén has created an incredible new video that combines thousands of photos of Jupiter to show the gas giant's newly developed massive storms.
It's a day of firsts for incredible new scientific missions. The European Space Agency's (ESA) new Biomass mission, launched into orbit just two months ago, has returned its first set of incredible images of Earth.
Last year, PetaPixel visited the SLAC Laboratories in Stanford to go hands-on with the LSST camera module, the highest-resolution and largest camera ever constructed. Last month, the team took the long journey to the summit of Cerro Pachón in Chile to go hands-on with the finished Vera C. Rubin Observatory and see its first 5 gigapixel photo.