NASA Hubble Finds New Neptune Moon

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has discovered a new moon orbiting the distant blue-green planet Neptune, the 14th known to be circling the giant planet.

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Supermoon in Washington

A supermoon rises behind the Washington Monument, Sunday, June 23, 2013, in Washington. This year the supermoon is up to 13.5% larger and 30% brighter than a typical full moon is.

 This is a result of the Moon reaching its perigree - the closest that it gets to the Earth during the course of its orbit. During perigree on June 23, the moon was about 221,824 miles away, as compared to the 252,581 miles away that it is at its furthest distance from the Earth (apogee). 

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Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

A View of Mercury From Afar

A View of Mercury From Afar

06/14/2013 12:00 AM EDT

This image of Mercury, acquired by the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) aboard NASA's MESSENGER mission on April 23, 2013, allows us to take a step back to view the planet. Prior to the MESSENGER mission, Mercury's surface was often compared to the surface of Earth's moon, when in fact, Mercury and the moon are very different.

This image in particular highlights many basins near Mercury's terminator, including Bach crater. Many craters with central peaks and the nearby bright rays of Han Kan crater are also evident. Once per week, MDIS captures images of Mercury's limb, with an emphasis on imaging the southern hemisphere limb.

These limb images provide information about Mercury's shape and complement measurements of topography made by the Mercury Laser Altimeter (MLA) of Mercury's northern hemisphere.

Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

The Moon and Sun

The Moon and Sun

06/13/2013 12:00 AM EDT

Two or three times a year, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory observes the moon traveling across the sun, blocking its view. While this obscures solar observations for a short while, it offers the chance for an interesting view of the shadow of the moon. 

The moon's crisp horizon can be seen up against the sun, because the moon does not have an atmosphere. (At other times of the year, when Earth blocks SDO's view, the Earth's horizon looks fuzzy due to its atmosphere.) If one looks closely at such a crisp border, the features of the moon's topography are visible, as is the case in this image from Oct. 7, 2010. 

This recently inspired two NASA visualizers to overlay a 3-dimensional model of the moon based on data from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, into the shadow of the SDO image. Such a task is fairly tricky, as the visualizers — Scott Wiessinger who typically works with the SDO imagery and Ernie Wright who works with the LRO imagery -- had to precisely match up data from the correct time and viewpoint for the two separate instruments. The end result is an awe-inspiring image of the sun and the moon. 

Image Credit: NASA/SDO/LRO/GSFC

NASA Ames Research Center News and Features Update

NASA Prepares for Launch of Next Solar Satellite

06/04/2013 12:00 AM EDT

NASA's next scientific satellite, which is scheduled for launch June 26, will provide the most detailed look ever at the sun's lower atmosphere.

NASA's Grail Mission Solves Mystery of Moon's Surface Gravity

NASA's Grail Mission Solves Mystery of Moon's Surface Gravity

05/30/2013 12:00 AM EDT

NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission has uncovered the origin of massive invisible regions that make the moon's gravity uneven, a phenomenon that affects the operations of lunar-orbiting spacecraft.