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NASA just released a treasure trove of cosmic images.
On Friday, the space agency released more than 50 new images captured by the legendary Hubble space telescope. Until now, NASA had not fully processed the rich images for publication.
Images include exploding stars, extremely dense star clusters, vivid singular galaxies, and more. Hubble achieves deep clarity because it orbits over Earth’s atmosphere, so its images are not clouded by our planet’s gases and climate. The telescope has also been upgraded five times by spacewalking astronauts.
“Hubble is today, at 30, even better than when it was launched and continues to make groundbreaking discoveries that challenge and advance our fundamental understanding of the cosmos,” NASA wrote.
The images below are known as “Caldwell catalog objects,” which are celestial bodies that can also be seen through telescopes (in less detail, of course) by amateur astronomers.
Caldwell 84, a star cluster.
Image: NASA / ESA, / A. SARAJEDINI (UNIVERSITY OF THE ATLANTIC FLORIDA) / AND G. PIOTTO (UNIVERSITY OF PADUA) / PROCESSING: GLADYS KOBER (NASA / CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA)
According to NASA: “This image shows the globular near-spherical star cluster Caldwell 84. It is a combination of observations taken in visible and ultraviolet light by two of Hubble’s science instruments, the Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Wide Field Camera 3 These observations helped astronomers better understand the motions and chemical abundances of the stars within the cluster. A relatively bright star, probably closer to us than the cluster, appears in the upper left corner of the cluster’s center in the Hubble image. “.
The Caldwell spiral galaxy 29.
Image: NASA / ESA / L. Ho (Peking University) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “Caldwell 29, also known as NGC 5005, is a spiral galaxy that probably harbors a supermassive black hole at its heart.”
The Caldwell 18 dwarf galaxy.
Image: NASA / ESA / A. Ferguson (University of Edinburgh, Institute of Astronomy) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “Caldwell 18 is a dwarf galaxy and a satellite of the Andromeda galaxy. Also known as NGC 185, it is a member of the Local Group of galaxies. Caldwell 18 is notable for its active galactic core, a region in the center of the galaxy that emits extreme radiation over part of the electromagnetic spectrum. “
The spiral galaxy Caldwell 40.
Image: NASA / ESA / P. Erwin (Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “Galaxies consist of a number of different structures, and the peculiarities of these structures drive the evolution of a given galaxy. One of those structures in spiral galaxies like Caldwell 40 (or NGC 3626) is the galactic bulge. This structure is a densely packed region of stars that encompasses the heart of a spiral galaxy.Most galactic bulbs host supermassive black holes, with the masses of the black hole and bulge typically linked (larger bulbs host more monstrous black holes ) “.
The Caldwell Galaxy 53.
Image: NASA / ESA / J. Erwin (University of Alabama) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “Lacking spiral arms but with a galactic bulge and prominent disk, lenticular galaxies such as Caldwell 53 (NGC 3115) are intermediate between the more familiar spiral and elliptical galaxies. This galaxy, like most of its kind , it houses an aging stellar population and has exhausted almost all of its star-forming material. “
Caldwell 56, a planetary nebula.
Image: NASA / ESA / J. Westphal (California Institute of Technology) / K. Werner (Eberhard Karls University) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “This serene view captures a part of the planetary nebula NGC 246, also known as Caldwell 56. Planetary nebulae are so named because when they were first observed through the first telescopes, they looked like planets. However, a planetary nebula is actually the final stage in the evolution of a star similar to our Sun. When the star reaches the end of its life, pulsations and strong stellar winds expel the gas envelopes from the star. The star’s hot, compact core emits intense radiation, causing the gas to glow for a few tens of thousands of years before the nebula dissolves, leaving a white dwarf like the one at the center of Caldwell 56 “.
The Caldwell 82 star cluster.
Image: NASA / ESA / J. Maiz Apellaniz (Centro de Astrobiologia [CSIC/INTA]) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “This open star cluster, Caldwell 82 (or NGC 6193), is home to about 30 stars. It includes two stars of type O, the most massive and luminous stars known. Type O stars are very rare and very hot , exceeding 30,000 Kelvin. (For reference, our Sun has a temperature of about 5,800 Kelvin.) Only about 1 in 3 million stars in our stellar neighborhood is an O-type star. “
The Caldwell Star Cluster 89.
Image: NASA / ESA / A. Riess (Johns Hopkins University) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “This bright collection of stars captured in infrared light by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 is part of Caldwell 89, also known as NGC 6087. This open cluster consists of approximately 40 stars.”
The Caldwell Dark Nebula 99.
Image: NASA / ESA / R. Sahai (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “This impressive image captures a small region at the edge of the Coal Sack Nebula, or Caldwell 99. Caldwell 99 is a dark nebula, a dense cloud of interstellar dust that completely blocks visible wavelengths of light. of the objects behind her. “
The Caldwell 108 star cluster.
Image: NASA / ESA / M. Reinhart (STScI) / Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA / Catholic University of America)
According to NASA: “For many years, it was believed that all stars in globular clusters formed in the same stellar nursery and aged together. The most massive stars exhaust their fuel supply in less than a million years and end their lives in a spectacular supernova. This process should have left globular clusters like Caldwell 108 (or NGC 4372) with only old, low-mass stars. However, young blue stars have been detected among the old Caldwell 108 stars and many other similar clusters. think that these stars, called blue laggards, are the result of collisions between stars or other stellar interactions. “
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