Lunar Farside

Tidally locked in synchronous rotation, the Moon always presents its familiar nearside to denizens of planet Earth. From lunar orbit, the Moon's farside can become familiar, though. In fact this sharp picture, a mosaic from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter's wide angle camera, is centered on the lunar farside. Part of a global mosaic of over 15,000 images acquired between November 2009 and February 2011, the highest resolution version shows features at a scale of 100 meters per pixel. Surprisingly, the rough and battered surface of the farside looks very different from the nearside covered with smooth dark lunar maria. The likely explanation is that the farside crust is thicker, making it harder for molten material from the interior to flow to the surface and form the smooth maria. via NASA http://ift.tt/2iN0CuU

Small Satellite Deployed From the Space Station

A satellite is ejected from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Small Satellite Orbital Deployer on the International Space Station on Dec. 19, 2016. The satellite is actually two small satellites that, once at a safe distance from the station, separated from each other, but were still connected by a 100-meter-long Kevlar tether. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hU5LNj

Hubble Gazes at a Cosmic Megamaser

This galaxy acts as an astronomical laser, beaming out microwave emission rather than visible light. via NASA http://ift.tt/2ihOnTW

Curiosity Surveys Lower Mount Sharp on Mars

If you could stand on Mars -- what might you see? If you were the Curiosity rover, then just last month you would have contemplated the featured image -- a breathtaking panorama of the lower portion of Mount Sharp. The colors have been adjusted to mimic lighting familiar to Earthlings. Surveyed here was a rocky plain before increasingly high rolling hills. The rounded hills in the middle distance, called the Sulfate Unit, are Curiosity's highest currently planned destination. One reason these hills are interesting is because sulfates are an energy source for some micro-organisms. The immediate path forward, though, was toward the southeast on the left part of the image. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hosYXb

Basking in Light

Sunlight truly has come to Saturn's north pole. The whole northern region is bathed in sunlight in this view from late 2016, feeble though the light may be at Saturn's distant domain in the solar system. via NASA http://ift.tt/2iqTKzS

M31: The Andromeda Galaxy

What is the nearest major galaxy to our own Milky Way Galaxy? Andromeda. In fact, our Galaxy is thought to look much like Andromeda. Together these two galaxies dominate the Local Group of galaxies. The diffuse light from Andromeda is caused by the hundreds of billions of stars that compose it. The several distinct stars that surround Andromeda's image are actually stars in our Galaxy that are well in front of the background object. Andromeda is frequently referred to as M31 since it is the 31st object on Messier's list of diffuse sky objects. M31 is so distant it takes about two million years for light to reach us from there. Although visible without aid, the featured image of M31 is a digital mosaic of several frames taken with a small telescope. Much about M31 remains unknown, including exactly how many billions of years it will before it collides with our home galaxy. via NASA http://ift.tt/2htoT8X

Lights in the Darkness

Just hours after the winter solstice, a mass of energetic particles from the Sun smashed into the magnetic field around Earth. The strong solar wind stream stirred up a display of northern lights over northern Canada. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hkyREI

The Magnificent Horsehead Nebula

Sculpted by stellar winds and radiation, a magnificent interstellar dust cloud by chance has assumed this recognizable shape. Fittingly named the Horsehead Nebula, it is some 1,500 light-years distant, embedded in the vast Orion cloud complex. About five light-years "tall", the dark cloud is cataloged as Barnard 33 and is visible only because its obscuring dust is silhouetted against the glowing red emission nebula IC 434. Stars are forming within the dark cloud. Contrasting blue reflection nebula NGC 2023, surrounding a hot, young star, is at the lower left. The gorgeous color image combines both narrowband and broadband images recorded using three different telescopes. via NASA http://ift.tt/2i5mZbE

Once Upon a Solstice Eve

Once upon a solstice eve a little prince gazed across a frozen little planet at the edge of a large galaxy. The little planet was planet Earth of course, seen in this horizon to horizon, nadir to zenith projection, a digitally stitched mosaic from the shores of the Sec reservoir in the Czech Republic. So the large galaxy must be the Milky Way, and the brightest beacon on the planet's horizon Venus, visible around the globe as this season's brilliant evening star. Celestial treasures in surrounding dark skies include the Pleiades star cluster, and the North America nebula found along a dusty galactic rift. Embracing Venus, Zodiacal light traces a faint band across the night, but the more colorful pillars of light shine above streets a little closer to home. via NASA http://ift.tt/2ik6RWz

Astronaut Peggy Whitson in the Festive Spirit

Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 50 Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson of NASA sent holiday greetings and festive imagery from the cupola on Dec. 18. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hk5FCF

Pandora Up Close

This image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft is one of the highest-resolution views ever taken of Saturn's moon Pandora. Pandora (84 kilometers, or 52 miles across) orbits Saturn just outside the narrow F ring. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hKYWR9

This Week in NASA History: First Crewed Saturn V Mission Launches -- Dec. 21, 1968

This week in 1968, Apollo 8, the first crewed Saturn V launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Dec. 21, 1968. Here, the S-IC stage is being erected for final assembly of the Saturn V launch vehicle in Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building. via NASA http://ift.tt/2i1MytA

Rumor Central: Giants have shown interest in trading for Twins 2B Brian Dozier - FanRag Sports; 42 HR, 99 RBI in 2016 (ESPN)

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This Week in NASA History: First Crewed Apollo Mission Launches -- Dec. 21, 1968

This week in 1968, Apollo 8, the first crewed Apollo mission, launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Dec. 21, 1968. Here, the S-IC stage is being erected for final assembly of the Saturn V launch vehicle in Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building. via NASA http://ift.tt/2haJE7x

Sharpless 308: Star Bubble

Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,200 light-years away toward the constellation of the Big Dog (Canis Major) and covers slightly more of the sky than a full moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated distance. The massive star that created the bubble, a Wolf-Rayet star, is the bright one near the center of the nebula. Wolf-Rayet stars have over 20 times the mass of the Sun and are thought to be in a brief, pre-supernova phase of massive star evolution. Fast winds from this Wolf-Rayet star create the bubble-shaped nebula as they sweep up slower moving material from an earlier phase of evolution. The windblown nebula has an age of about 70,000 years. Relatively faint emission captured in the expansive image is dominated by the glow of ionized oxygen atoms mapped to a blue hue. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gXLXYn

International Space Station Solar Transit

This composite image, made from ten frames, shows the International Space Station, with a crew of six onboard, in silhouette as it transits the sun at roughly five miles per second, Saturday, Dec. 17, 2016, from Newbury Park, California. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hn2rKs

Supermoon over Spanish Castle

No, this castle was not built with the Moon attached. To create the spectacular juxtaposition, careful planning and a bit of good weather was needed. Pictured, the last supermoon of 2016 was captured last week rising directly beyond one of the towers of Bellver Castle in Palma de Mallorca on the Balearic Islands of Spain. The supermoon was the last full moon of 2016 and known to some as the Oak Moon. Bellver Castle was built in the early 1300s and has served as a home -- but occasional as a prison -- to numerous kings and queens. The Moon was built about 4.5 billion years ago, possibly resulting from a great collision with a Mars-sized celestial body and Earth. The next supermoon, defined as when the moon appears slightly larger and brighter than usual, will occur on 2017 December 3 and be visible not only behind castles but all over the Earth. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hA2eqg

Cosmic ‘Winter’ Wonderland

Although there are no seasons in space, this cosmic vista invokes thoughts of a frosty winter landscape. It is, in fact, a region called NGC 6357 where radiation from hot, young stars is energizing the cooler gas in the cloud that surrounds them. via NASA http://ift.tt/2h4q8v8

Giants sign 4-time Gold Glove SS Jimmy Rollins to minor league deal - reports; hit .221 in 41 games with White Sox (ESPN)

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Southern Jupiter from Perijove 3

Southern Jupiter looms some 37,000 kilometers away in this JunoCam image from December 11. The image data was captured near Juno's third perijove or closest approach to Jupiter, the spacecraft still in its 53 day long looping orbit. With the south polar region on the left, the large whitish oval toward the right is massive, counterclockwise rotating storm system. Smaller than the more famous Great Red Spot, the oval storm is only about half the diameter of planet Earth, one of a string of white ovals currently in the southern hemisphere of the Solar System's, ruling gas giant. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hZSClv

Hubble "Crane-s" in for a Closer Look at a Galaxy

Spiral galaxy IC 5201 sits 40 million light-years from us in the Crane constellation. As with most spirals we see, it has a bar of stars slicing through its center. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gSlccM

View of NASA's CYGNSS Hurricane Mission Launch From Chase Plane

Hurricane forecasters will soon have a new tool to better understand and forecast storm intensity. A constellation of eight microsatellites, called NASA’s Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System mission, or CYGNSS, got a boost into Earth orbit aboard an Orbital ATK Pegasus XL rocket, deployed from an L-1011 aircraft. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gNzyLp

The Lagoon Nebula in High Definition

Stars are battling gas and dust in the Lagoon Nebula but the photographers are winning. Also known as M8, this photogenic nebula is visible even without binoculars towards the constellation of Sagittarius. The energetic processes of star formation create not only the colors but the chaos. The red-glowing gas results from high-energy starlight striking interstellar hydrogen gas. The dark dust filaments that lace M8 were created in the atmospheres of cool giant stars and in the debris from supernovae explosions. The light from M8 we see today left about 5,000 years ago. Light takes about 50 years to cross this section of M8. Data used to compose this image was taken with the wide-field camera OmegaCam of the ESO's VLT Survey Telescope (VST). via NASA http://ift.tt/2hEMAur

Color Variations on Mount Sharp, Mars

The foreground of this scene from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows purple-hued rocks near the rover's late-2016 location on lower Mount Sharp. The scene's middle distance includes higher layers that are future destinations for the mission. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hwMORD

Meteors over Four Girl Mountains

On some nights it rains meteors. Peaking over the next two nights, asteroid dust is expected to rain down on Earth during the annual Geminids meteor shower. This year, unfortunately, fainter Geminids will be harder to see because of the brightness of the Long Nights Full Moon, which occurs Wednesday. Pictured, an image from this year's Perseids meteor shower in August captured multiple streaks over Four Girls Mountain in central China. The bright Pleaides open star cluster appears toward the upper right, while numerous emission nebulas are visible in red, many superposed on the diagonal band of the Milky Way. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gHbmsn

HTV-6 Cargo Craft Approaches Space Station

Expedition 50 Commander Shane Kimbrough of NASA shared this photograph of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Kounotori H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV-6) as it approached the International Space Station. Kimbrough and Flight Engineer Thomas Pesquet successfully captured the spacecraft using the station's Canadarm2 robotic arm. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gWGfGZ

The Coolest Landscape on Mars (or Earth)

Many Martian landscapes contain features that are familiar to ones we find on Earth, like river valleys, cliffs, glaciers and volcanos. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gsJXXz

Rumor Central: Giants want to add power bat, have checked in on free-agent 1B Mark Reynolds - CSN Bay Area (ESPN)

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The Lunar X

The striking X appearing in this lunarscape is easily visible in binoculars or a small telescope. Yet, not too many have seen it. The catch is this lunar X is fleeting, only apparent in the hours before the Moon's first quarter phase. At the terminator, or shadow line between lunar day and night, the X illusion is produced by a configuration of the craters Blanchinus, La Caille and Purbach. Near the Moon's first quarter phase, an astronaut standing close to the craters' position would see the slowly rising Sun very near the horizon. Temporarily, the crater walls would be in sunlight while the crater floors were still in darkness. Seen from planet Earth, contrasting sections of bright walls against the dark floors by chance look remarkably like an X. This sharp image of the Lunar X was captured at approximately 16:45 UT on December 6, 2016. For extra credit, sweep your gaze along the lunar terminator and you can also spot the Lunar V. via NASA http://ift.tt/2hg43Ja

IC 4628: The Prawn Nebula

South of Antares, in the tail of the nebula-rich constellation Scorpius, lies emission nebula IC 4628. Nearby hot, massive stars, millions of years young, irradiate the nebula with invisible ultraviolet light, stripping electrons from atoms. The electrons eventually recombine with the atoms to produce the visible nebular glow, dominated by the red emission of hydrogen. At an estimated distance of 6,000 light-years, the region shown is about 250 light-years across, spanning over three full moons on the sky. The nebula is also cataloged as Gum 56 for Australian astronomer Colin Stanley Gum, but seafood-loving astronomers might know this cosmic cloud as the Prawn Nebula. The tantalizing color image is a new astronomical composition using data from the European Southern Observatory's wide field OmegaCAM and amateur images made under dark skies on the Canary Island of Tenerife. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gs74oH

Sunrise With Solar Array

Astronaut Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency captured this photograph from the International Space Station on Nov. 25, 2016, and shared it on social media, writing, "Sunrises. We experience 16 sunrises every 24 hours on the International Space Station as it takes us 90 minutes to do a complete orbit of our planet flying at 28,800 km/h." via NASA http://ift.tt/2htfFoS

Rumor Central: Giants unlikely to trade for Tigers OF J.D. Martinez after Mark Melancon signing - Mercury News (ESPN)

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Linear Dunes, Namib Sand Sea

An astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) used a long lens to document what crews have termed one of the most spectacular features of the planet: the dunes of the Namib Sand Sea. via NASA http://ift.tt/2godViQ

Rumor Central: Giants don't intend to bring relievers Sergio Romo, Javier Lopez and Santiago Casilla back - CSN Bay Area (ESPN)

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Giants trade P Chris Heston to Mariners for a player to be named later - reports; pitched in only 4 games last season (ESPN)

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Rumor Central: Giants shopping P Chris Heston - Jerry Crasnick; threw no-hitter as rookie in 2015 (ESPN)

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Rumor Central: Giants, P Madison Bumgarner currently not negotiating new extension - San Francisco Chronicle (ESPN)

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Oceanic Nonlinear Internal Solitary Waves From the Lombok Strait

On November 1, 2016, NASA’s Aqua satellite passed over Indonesia, allowing the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board to capture a stunning true-color image of oceanic nonlinear internal solitary waves from the Lombok Strait. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gTsLOY

Aurora over Jupiters South Pole from Juno

Why is there a glowing oval over Jupiter's South Pole? Aurora. Near the closest part of its first pass near Jupiter in August, NASA's robotic spacecraft Juno captured this dramatic infrared image of a bright auroral ring. Auroras are caused by high energy particles from the Sun interacting with a planet's magnetic field, and ovals around magnetic poles are common. Data from Juno are giving preliminary indications that Jupiter's magnetic field and aurorae are unexpectedly powerful and complex. Unfortunately, a computer glitch caused Juno to go into safe mode during its last pass near the Jovian giant in September. That glitch has now been resolved, making Juno ready for its next pass over Jupiter's cloud tops this coming Sunday. via NASA http://ift.tt/2h2oM3h

Sahara Desert From the Space Station's EarthKAM

Middle school students programmed a camera aboard the International Space Station -- the Sally Ride EarthKAM -- to photograph this portion of the Sahara desert in western Libya on October 3, 2016. The Expedition 50 crew set up the EarthKAM gear in the Harmony module’s Earth-facing hatch window, to allow students to photograph targets on Earth. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gz3WVF

Lightning over Colorado

Have you ever watched a lightning storm in awe? Join the crowd. Oddly, nobody knows exactly how lightning is produced. What is known is that charges slowly separate in some clouds causing rapid electrical discharges (lightning), but how electrical charges get separated in clouds remains a topic of much research. Lightning usually takes a jagged course, rapidly heating a thin column of air to about three times the surface temperature of the Sun. The resulting shock wave starts supersonically and decays into the loud sound known as thunder. Lightning bolts are common in clouds during rainstorms, and on average 44 lightning bolts occur on the Earth every second. Pictured, over 60 images were stacked to capture the flow of lightning-producing storm clouds in July over Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA. via NASA http://ift.tt/2ha4WUe

Rumor Central: Giants have expressed interest in free agent P J.P. Howell for one-year deal - Buster Olney (ESPN)

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MLB: Giants and P Mark Melancon agree on a deal, pending physical - Buster Olney; league-high 98 saves last 2 seasons (ESPN)

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Giants Buzz: Free-agent reliever Mark Melancon close to deal - Fox Sports; 47 saves in 2016 with Pirates, Nationals (ESPN)

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Chaos at Hyperion

The moon Hyperion tumbles as it orbits Saturn. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gbL5C4

Official Star Names for Orion

Familiar stars in Orion and constellations across the sky now have official names. Over the past year, the International Astronomical Union, the only body officially tasked with naming stars, approved names already in common use for 227 of the brightest stars, including the most famous stars on the sky Sirius, Polaris, and Betelgeuse. Pictured, the constellation of Orion is shown with several of these now-official star names superposed. Spanning about 30 degrees, this breath-taking vista stretches across the well-known constellation from head to toe (left to right) and beyond. The common names for all three stars in Orion's belt are also now official. At 1,500 light years away, the Great Orion Nebula is the closest large star forming region, here visible just right and below center. Also visible are famous nebulae including the Horsehead Nebula and the Witch Head Nebula. Of course, the Orion Nebula and bright stars are easy to see with the unaided eye, but dust clouds and emission from the extensive interstellar gas in this nebula-rich complex, are too faint and much harder to record. In the featured mosaic of broadband telescopic images, additional image data acquired with a narrow hydrogen alpha filter was used to bring out the pervasive tendrils of energized atomic hydrogen gas like in the arc of the giant Barnard's Loop. via NASA http://ift.tt/2g7BSuF

Rumor Central: Giants among teams with four-year, $60 million-plus contract offer out to P Mark Melancon - FOX Sports (ESPN)

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A Triple Star is Born

A triple star system is forming, enshrouded within this dusty natal disk some 750 light-years away in the Perseus molecular cloud. Imaged at millimeter wavelengths by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, the extreme close-up shows two protostars separated by a mere 61 AU (1 AU is the Earth-Sun distance) with a third 183 AU from the central protostar. The ALMA image also reveals a clear spiral structure indicating instability and fragmentation led to the multiple protostellar objects within the disk. Astronomers estimate that the system, cataloged as L1448 IRS3B, is less than 150,000 years old. Captured at an early phase, the starforming scenario is likely not at all uncommon, since almost half of all sun-like stars have at least one companion. via NASA http://ift.tt/2fOoNI1

Giants Podcast: GM Bobby Evans says team is "still in search mode," needs clarity on who closer is - Baseball Tonight (ESPN)

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Hidden Figures Premiere and Award Ceremony

Actress Octavia Spencer, left, who plays Dorothy Vaughan in the film "Hidden Figures" and NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, right, greets NASA "human computer" Katherine Johnson, at a reception to honor NASA's "human computers" on Thursday, Dec. 1, 2016, at the Virginia Air and Space Center in Hampton, VA. via NASA http://ift.tt/2fP1tKo

Flaming Star Nebula

A runaway star lights the Flaming Star Nebula in this cosmic scene. Otherwise known as IC 405, the Flaming Star Nebula's billowing interstellar clouds of gas and dust lie about 1,500 light-years away toward the constellation of Auriga. AE Aurigae, the bright star at upper left in the frame, is a massive and intensely hot O-type star moving rapidly through space, likely ejected from a collision of multiple star-systems in the vicinity of the Orion Nebula millions of years ago. Now close to IC 405, the high-speed star's ionizing ultraviolet radiation powers the visible reddish glow as the nebula's hydrogen atoms are stripped of their electrons and recombine. Its intense blue starlight is reflected by the nebula's dusty filaments. Like all massive stars AE Aurigae will be short-lived though, furiously burning through its supply of fuel for nuclear fusion and exploding as a supernova. The colorful telescopic snapshot spans about 5 light-years at the estimated distance of the Flaming Star Nebula. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gP8k2y

Rift in Antarctica's Larsen C Ice Shelf

On Nov. 10, 2016, scientists on NASA's IceBridge mission photographed an oblique view of a massive rift in the Antarctic Peninsula's Larsen C ice shelf. Icebridge, an airborne survey of polar ice, completed an eighth consecutive Antarctic deployment on Nov. 18. via NASA http://ift.tt/2gQdJ9s