PIX4613620: Interacting galaxies ESO 593 - 8 in Sagittarius - Interacting galaxies ESO 593 - 8 in Sagittarius - The galaxy ESO 593 - 8 is located about 650 million years away from Earth. It's a pair of interacting galaxies that will probably merge into a single galaxy. Regions of intense star formations appear in blue. Image obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope on 19 March 2002. ESO 593 - 8 is an impressive pair of interacting galaxies with a feather - like galaxy crossing a companion galaxy. The two components will probably merge to form a single galaxy in the future. The pair is adorned with a number of bright blue star clusters. ESO 593 - 8 is located in the constellation of Sagittarius, the Archer, some 650 million light - years away from Earth. Image taken by the Hubble space telescope on march 19, 2002 / Bridgeman Images
PIX4616305: Volcano Arsia Mons - Arsia Mons volcano. - Arsia Mons is one of the largest known volcanoes. It stands more than 9 km above the surrounding plains and its caldera extends for 110 km. Mosaic of infrared images obtained by the Mars Odyssey probe. Arsia Mons is the southernmost of the Tharsis volcanoes. It is 270 miles in diameter, almost 12 miles high, and the summit caldera is 72 miles wide. For comparison, the largest volcano on Earth is Mauna Loa. From its base on the sea floor, Mauna Loa measures only 6.3 miles high and 75 miles in diameter. The image here is a mosaic of several daytime IR images taken by the Mars Odyssey spacecraft / Bridgeman Images
PIX4616373: Crater Bacolor on Mars - Bacolor Crater on planet Mars - View of the impact crater Bacolor obtained by the Mars Odyssey probe. It's an impact crater about 20 km in diameter. Bacolor Crater is a magnificent impact feature about 20 kilometers (12 miles) wide. The lines on the ejecta blanket surrounding the crater rim come from a surge of superheated gas and debris flying outward in the wake of the meteorite impact that made the crater. This view combines images taken during the period from September 2002 to October 2005 by the Thermal Emission Imaging System instrument on Nasa's Mars Odyssey orbiter. The pictured location on Mars is 33 degrees north latitude, 118.6 degrees east longitude / Bridgeman Images
PIX4616489: Martian dunes in Spring - March: Frost - covered dunes in crater - Detail on dunes in a crater located near the north pole of Mars. Clearly, areas covered with carbon dioxide gel appear on this image obtained by the HIRISE camera of the Mars Reconnaissance probe orbiter on January 1, 2010. HIRISE is a 50 cm telescope that observes visible and near infrared Dunes are often found on crater floors. In the winter time at high northern latitudes the terrain is covered by carbon dioxide ice (dry ice). In the spring as this seasonal ice evaporates many unusual features unique to Mars are visible. On the floor of this crater where there are no dunes, the ice forms an uninterrupted layer. On the dunes however, dark streaks form as surface material from below the ice is mobilized and deposited on top of the ice. In some cases this mobile material probably slides down the steep face of the dune, while in other cases it may be literally blown out in a process of gas release similar to removing a cork from a champagne bottle. Image taken on 1 January 2010 by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) spacecraft / Bridgeman Images
PIX4616602: Sol de Mars seen by the Phoenix probe - Mars: Phoenix landing site - Image obtained by the Phoenix probe shortly after its successful landing on the Mars surface on May 25, 2008. The probe landed on a vast plain north of the planet in the Vastitas Borealis region. This image, one of the first captured by Nasa's Phoenix Mars Lander, shows the vast plains of the northern polar region of Mars. The flat landscape is strewn with tiny pebbles and shows polygonal cracking, a pattern seen widely in Martian high latitudes and also observed in permafrost terrains on Earth. The polygonal cracking is believed to have resulted from seasonal freezing and thawing of surface ice. Phoenix touched down on the Red Planet at 4:53 p.m. Pacific Time (7:53 p.m. Eastern Time), May 25, 2008, in an arctic region called Vastitas Borealis, at 68 degrees north latitude, 234 degrees east longitude. This is an approximate - color image taken shortly after landing by the spacecraft's Surface Stereo Imager, inferred from two color filters, a violet, 450 - nanometer filter and an infrared, 750 - nanometer filter / Bridgeman Images
PIX4616695: Mars surface seen by the rover Curiosity 09/2015 - Martian surface seen from the rover Curiosity 09/2015: Panorama of the surface of Mars on Mount Sharp. Mosaic of images obtained by the rover Curiosity on September 9, 2015. This composite image looking toward the higher regions of Mount Sharp was taken on September 9, 2015, by Nasa's Curiosity rover. In the foreground - about 2 miles (3 kilometers) from the rover - is a long ridge teeming with hematite, an iron oxide. Just beyond is an undulating plain rich in clay minerals. And just beyond that are a multitude of rounded buttes, all high in sulfate minerals. The changing mineralogy in these layers of Mount Sharp suggests a changing environment in early Mars, though all involve exposure to water billions of years ago. Further back in the image are striking, light-toned cliffs in rock that may have formed in drier times and now is heavily eroded by winds. The colors are adjusted so that rocks look approximately as they would if they were on Earth, to help geologists interpret the rocks. This “” white balancing”” to adjust for the lighting on Mars overly compensates for the absence of blue on Mars, making the sky appear light blue and sometimes giving dark, black rocks a blue cast / Bridgeman Images
PIX4592024: Constellation Lievre - Constellation of Lepus - The constellation Lievre is located below the constellation Orion. On the left, the bright star Sirius. Despite the faintness of its stars, Lepus (the Hare) was known in ancient Greece, as was Orion the hunter, at whose feet it resides, inconspicuously. The hare (or rabbit) is a creature traditionally associated with the Moon, since, with imagination, the man in the Moon features can also be seen as a rabbit. This connection with Orion makes mythological sense, since the Moon was perpetually chased across the sky by the Sun and Orion is a Sun god. Lepus is a middling - sized constellation, ranking 51 in size in the modern 88. Its brightest star is Alpha Leporis (Arneb), from the Arabic al-arnab meaning 'the hare'. Also visible in the image is R Leporis, Hind's Crimson star, whose brightness varies over 5 magnitudes (100 times) over a period of 423 days. It is a carbon star and at its maximum is a fine sight in a small telescope or good binoculars / Bridgeman Images
PIX4592063: Constellations of the Lion, Cancer and Gemeaux - Leo, Cancer and Gemini constellations - September 26, 2006, Monts d'Arree (Finistere - France). In overprint, the mythological forms of these constellations, extracted from the Uranographia of Hevelius. Mythological Constellations forms from “” Uranographia”” star atlas by Hevelius (1690) have been added. September 26 2006, Monts d'Arree (Finistere - France) / Bridgeman Images
PIX4592348: Constellation Ophiuchus - Constellation of Ophiuchus - The constellation Ophiuchus separates the constellation of the Snake into two parts. The constellation of Ophiuchus is located between Serpens Caput and Serpens Cauda, two parts of the constellation of Serpens. The southern part of Ophiuchus contains one of the darkest and most visually distinctive dark clouds of the Miky Way. It is popularly known as the Dark Horse nebula - - the body of the horse runs north - south and its legs point towards the bright star Antares. The hind quarters of the horse make up the (smoker's) Pipe nebula, with the stem pointing to Antares. The dust of forelegs reaches a long way in the direction of Antares, where it is illuminated by stars associated with Rho Ophiuchi to make a distinctive reflection nebula. The dusty clouds of the Dark Horse nebula hide the northern part of the Milky Way's central bulge. The southern part (in Sagittarius) is relatively unobscured. Without this dust the extent of the Milky Way's bulge would be much more apparent to the unaided eye and without it our understanding of the nature of our galaxy as a flattened disk might have come sooner / Bridgeman Images
PIX4592542: Star sky above an old chapel - Starry sky above an old chapel - The star Sirius shines above the chapel of Languidou (Finistere); above the right, the constellation of Orion and in the upper right corner, the passage of an artificial satellite. 21/10/2007 Star Sirius shines with Orion constellation above the old chapel of Languidou (Finistere, France). In the right upper corner, an artificial satellite left a trail. 21/10/200 / Bridgeman Images
PIX4614938: Mars seen by the Hubble Space Telescope - 1997 - Images obtained on March 10, 1997 just before the opposition of Mars when the planet was only 100 million km away from Earth. These three clicks were taken during three separate orbits of about 6 hours for Mars to rotate 90 degrees during each orbit and thus present almost its entire surface. / Bridgeman Images