2026-10-22
NASA Science
The universe showed off again today: NASA Science. Here is what NASA captured:
Why this matters
Behind the picture is the night sky. Light that left these objects long ago is only reaching us now, which is why a single image can double as a snapshot of the distant past.
See it live on ObjectTracer
This connects to what you can track in real time on our 3D globe — explore Deep Space. Or open the live globe to watch flights, satellites, the ISS and spacecraft move right now.
The science, from NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day
Star light, star bright: is there a green star out tonight? Other than the Sun, all stars are so far from Earth that they appear as points in the sky. They are mostly white, but sometimes noticeably red or blue. This color typically relates to the temperature: blue stars are hotter than red stars. What about other colors? The featured image is an illustration showing WD J1330+6435, a white dwarf star, surrounded by an accretion disk with gas and rocks orbiting the star. White dwarfs are small, faint stars that are left over when a star like the Sun exhausts its nuclear fuel. Astronomers recently found that some white dwarf stars, despite their name, would appear yellow, green, cyan, pink, or purple. In these cases, trace elements that were accreted to these stars interact with the stellar atmosphere and shift its normally white color. But, alas! I wish I may, I wish I might, but they are too faint to see tonight...
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (public domain)
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