Daily Archives: February 10, 2015

17 photos

The Hubble Space Telescope also captured images of Jupiter's three great moons -- Io, Callisto and Europa -- passing by at once.

17 photos

Using powerful optics, astronomers have found a planet-like body, J1407b, with rings 200 times the size of Saturn's. This is an artist's depiction of the rings of planet J1407b, which are eclipsing a star.

17 photos

A patch of stars appears to be missing in this image from the La Silla Observatory in Chile. But the stars are actually still there behind a cloud of gas and dust called Lynds Dark Nebula 483. The cloud is about 700 light years from Earth in the constellation Serpens (The Serpent).

17 photos

This is the largest Hubble Space Telescope image ever assembled. It's a portion of the galaxy next door, Andromeda (M31).

17 photos

NASA has captured a stunning new image of the so-called "Pillars of Creation," one of the space agency's most iconic discoveries. The giant columns of cold gas, in a small region of the Eagle Nebula, were popularized by a similar image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995.

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Hubble Telescope spots smiley face in space

TIME Science space Hubble Telescope Spots an Emoticon in Outer Space Hubble/ESA/NASA Galaxy cluster SDSS J1038+4849 It's actually a cluster of galaxies

In the center of this Hubble Telescope image is the galaxy cluster SDSS J1038+4849 and it appears to be smiling back at you.

The two orange eyes of the grinning face are actually two distant galaxies, and the peculiar smile was caused by an effect known as strong gravitational lensing.

Galaxy clusters are so large that they can create a strong gravitational pull that warps the time and space surrounding them. From afar this creates a distorted view of reality, known as a cosmic lens.

There are thousands of images within the Hubble database that have only been viewed by a few scientists. However, Hubble opens up its massive database to the public to search through. A version of this particular image was brought to attention by a contestant, Judy Smith, through the Hubbles Hidden Treasures image processing competition.

Read next: In Praise of Emoticons

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Hubble Telescope Spots an Emoticon in Outer Space

17 photos

The Hubble Space Telescope also captured images of Jupiter's three great moons -- Io, Callisto and Europa -- passing by at once.

17 photos

Using powerful optics, astronomers have found a planet-like body, J1407b, with rings 200 times the size of Saturn's. This is an artist's depiction of the rings of planet J1407b, which are eclipsing a star.

17 photos

A patch of stars appears to be missing in this image from the La Silla Observatory in Chile. But the stars are actually still there behind a cloud of gas and dust called Lynds Dark Nebula 483. The cloud is about 700 light years from Earth in the constellation Serpens (The Serpent).

17 photos

This is the largest Hubble Space Telescope image ever assembled. It's a portion of the galaxy next door, Andromeda (M31).

17 photos

NASA has captured a stunning new image of the so-called "Pillars of Creation," one of the space agency's most iconic discoveries. The giant columns of cold gas, in a small region of the Eagle Nebula, were popularized by a similar image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995.

See the rest here:
Say cheese! Hubble Telescope spots smiley face in space