Astronomical Illustrations

This artist's impression shows a large planetoid crashing into the primordial Earth. In the last stages of the formation of Earth (4.5 billion years ago), it may have been struck a few times by objects about the size of Pluto (1,500 - 2,000 miles ...

An image of the entire sky projected like a map shows the Milky Way Galaxy’s appearance from our perspective within the disk. This image was constructed from infrared data collected by the 2MASS project. Infrared light passes through much of the ...

A CD with a marble in its center is a good model for the structure of the Milky Way Galaxy. Note that this model is stuck to a stand and viewed at two different angles: mostly face-on (top) and edge-on (bottom). (Image credit: Bryan Mendez, UC ...

The magnetic field of Earth is similar to that of a bar magnet. The magnetic poles are not aligned with the rotation (geographic) poles of Earth. The location of the magnetic poles changes with time and even flips with respect to the rotation ...

From a perspective in space, we can see that the Earth and the Sun do not align with the center of the Milky Way Galaxy on December 21st, 2012. This perspective is from above the plane of the Solar System and we can see the two different lines of ...

From a perspective in space, we can see that the Earth and the Sun do not align with the center of the Milky Way Galaxy on December 21st, 2012. This perspective is from within the plane of the Solar System looking from behind Earth toward the Sun ...

A view of the sky seen in visible light from the Digitized Sky Survey. The Sun’s position on December 21st, 2012 is plotted. This cannot be directly observed on this date since the Sun’s brightness lights up the sky making it much brighter than ...

A view of the sky seen in infrared light from NASA’s Infrared Astronomical Satellite, or IRAS, mission. The Sun’s position on December 21st, 2012 is plotted. This cannot be directly observed on this date since the Sun’s brightness lights up the ...