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Mato Vega Fire, Colorado
Title Mato Vega Fire, Colorado
Description In the Sangre de Cristo Mountains of southern Colorado, the Mato Vega Fire burned in timber, debris left over from logging, and grass in mid-June 2006. This image was captured by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) [ http://modis.gsfc.nasa.gov ] on NASA's Terra [ http://terra.nasa.gov ] satellite on June 20, 2006. The locations in which MODIS detected actively burning fire are outlined in red. The fire is spreading smoke out over the plains to the northeast. According to the National Interagency Fire Center [ http://www.nifc.gov/information.html ] report from June 21, the fire was 8,960 acres and only 5 percent contained. This image has a spatial resolution (level of detail) of 250 meters per pixel. The large image shows a wider area at the same resolution. The MODIS Rapid Response System provides this image at additional resolutions. [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/subsets/?AERONET_BSRN_BAO_Boulder ] NASA image courtesy the MODIS Rapid Response Team, [ http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov ] Goddard Space Flight Center
Asteroid 2002 NY40
Title Asteroid 2002 NY40
Explanation Asteroid 2002 NY40 [ http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2002/ 30jul_ny40.htm ] will fly by planet Earth early in the morning August 18 Universal Time (late in the evening August 17 Eastern Daylight Time). Approaching to within [ http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/ ] about 530,000 kilometers or 1.3 times the Earth-Moon distance 2002 NY40 [ http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db?name=2002+NY40 ] will definitely not be close enough to pose any danger of collision. But it will be close enough and just bright enough for experienced skygazers to see this 800 meter wide space rock [ http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/ asteroids.html ] in a small telescope or binoculars as it glides quickly through northern skies [ http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2002/images/ny40/ skymap_ut.gif ] past the bright star Vega. It will also be close enough to ping with radar [ http://echo.jpl.nasa.gov/ ], and asteroid hunters using the large Arecibo radio telescope [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap981129.html ] in Puerto Rico expect to determine the three dimensional outline of 2002 NY40. Similar investigations of other near Earth [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970120.html ] asteroids have revealed some surprising shapes [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap000510.html ]. In this five minute time exposure, recorded at Cerro Tololo [ http://www.ctio.noao.edu/ ] Inter-American Observatory on August 14, 2002 NY40 shows itself as a long smudge as it moves against a background of faint stars in the constellation Aquarius [ http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/the_universe/ Constellations/aquarius.html ].
Vega Credit: D. Moffatt (DOA …
Title Vega Credit: D. Moffatt (DOA [ http://www.dao.nrc.ca/ ]), ScienceWeb [ http://scienceweb.dao.nrc.ca/ ], Starry Messenger Communications
Explanation Vega is a bright blue star 25 light years away. Vega [ http://stardate.utexas.edu/radio/StarDateDB.FM$RETRIEVE?value=06/15/1996&field=ScriptAirDate&html=Test+Request+Date ] is the brightest star in the Summer Triangle [ http://eagle.online.discovery.com/DCO/doc/1012/world/starshack/starshack080796/starshack.html ], a group of stars easily visible summer evenings in the northern hemisphere. The name Vega [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/hr/7001.html ] derives from Arabic origins, and means "stone eagle." 4,000 years ago, however, Vega [ http://stardate.utexas.edu/radio/StarDateDB.FM$RETRIEVE?value=05/20/1995&field=ScriptAirDate&html=Test+Request+Date ] was known by some as "Ma'at" - one example of ancient human astronomical knowledge and language. 14,000 years ago, Vega [ http://stardate.utexas.edu/radio/StarDateDB.FM$RETRIEVE?value=07/10/1994&field=ScriptAirDate&html=Test+Request+Date ], not Polaris [ http://www.arcorp.com/polaris.html ], was the north star [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap961201.html ]. Vega [ http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?1995ApJ%2E%2E%2E450%2E%2E364G&db_key=AST&nosetcookie=1 ] is the fifth brightest star in the night sky, and has a diameter almost three times that of our Sun. Life [ http://www.seti-inst.edu/phoenix/contact.html ] bearing planets, rich in liquid water, could possibly exist around Vega [ http://lsnt7.lightspeed.net/~astronomy/lifezones/lifezones.html ]. The above picture [ http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/comet/moffatt1.html ], taken in January, finds Vega, the Summer Triangle [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap961212.html ], and Comet Hale-Bopp [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970610.html ] high above Victoria [ http://www.city.victoria.bc.ca/ ], British Columbia [ http://www.gov.bc.ca/ ], Canada.
Three Dusty Stars
Title Three Dusty Stars
Explanation These separate radio images [ http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/~wsh/press/dustydisks.html ] reveal three dusty debris disks [ http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/~wsh/press/images.html ] surrounding three bright, young, nearby stars - evidence for solar systems [ http://wwwusr.obspm.fr/departement/darc/planets/encycl.html ] in formation. From left to right are the stars Fomalhaut [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/hr/8728.html ], Beta Pictoris [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980122.html ], and Vega [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970715.html ], their positions indicated by star symbols. The false color maps show the intensity of submillimeter radio emission from the surrounding dust. Next to each dust "disk", a vertical bar illustrates the present size of our own solar system. These observations are likely examples of what our solar system [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap961214.html ] would have looked like to distant radio astronomers [ http://www.seti-inst.edu/phoenix/contact.html ] when it was only a few hundred million years old! Astronomers speculate that bright blobs of emission near Vega and Beta Pictoris may represent dust clouds around developing giant planets. The radio images were made using detectors [ http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/JCMT/scuba/ ] cooled to near absolute zero [ http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/staff/blynds/tmp.html ] and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope [ http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/JCMT/home.html ] at Mauna Kea Observatory in Hawaii [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap970302.html ].
HR 4796A: Not Saturn
Title HR 4796A: Not Saturn
Explanation These are not false-color renderings of the latest observations of Saturn's magnificent rings [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980424.html ]. Instead, the panels show a strikingly similar system on a much larger scale - a ring around the young, Vega-like star, HR 4796A [ http://oposite.stsci.edu/pubinfo/pr/1999/03/b.html ], located about 200 light-years from Earth. Probably composed of dusty debris ground from colliding planetesimals, this ring is confined to a zone less than 17 AU wide (1 AU equals the Earth-Sun distance) and girdles the star at a radius of about 70 AU, roughly twice the orbital radius of Neptune. In analogy with the relationship of Saturn's rings and moons [ http://ringmaster.arc.nasa.gov/reference/abstracts/cuzzi1984_01.html ], this circumstellar ring could be held in place by forces due to planets - shepherding planetary bodies or the gravitational influence of larger planets orbiting closer to the parent star. In any event, because the ring would not survive long without something to keep it there, astronomers consider its presence strong evidence for unseen planetary bodies [ http://www.generation.net/~mariob/astro/xtrasol.htm ] around HR 4796A. The top panels show the false-color images [ http://nicmosis.as.arizona.edu:8000/AAS99/hr4796_postrev5.ps ] at two infrared wavelengths from the Hubble Space Telescope's NICMOS instrument [ http://nicmos.as.arizona.edu/ ], and the bottom panels trace the corresponding image contours. At the center of each, the overwhelming light of HR 4796A has been masked to reveal the fainter circumstellar ring.
Polaris: The North Star
Title Polaris: The North Star
Explanation Polaris is quite an unusual star. First, Polaris [ http://einstein.stcloudstate.edu/Dome/constellns/polaris.html ] is the nearest bright star to the north spin axis [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980912.html ] of the Earth. Therefore, as the Earth turns, stars appear to rotate around Polaris [ http://www.physics.pacificu.edu/sci170/movies/nightly.html ], making it the North Star [ http://www.physics.csbsju.edu/astro/CS/CS.03.html ]. Since no bright star is near the south spin axis of the Earth, there is currently no South Star [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap960503.html ]. Thousands of years ago, Earth's spin axis pointed in a slightly different direction [ http://www.fourmilab.ch/yoursky/help/precession.html ], and Vega [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980823.html ] was the North Star. Although Polaris [ http://www.seds.org/~spider/spider/Misc/alphaUMi.html ] is not the brightest star [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/extra/brightest.html ] on the sky, it is easily located because it is nearly aligned with two stars in the cup of the Big Dipper [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/constellations/Ursa_Major.html ], and is the last star in the handle of the Little Dipper [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/constellations/Ursa_Minor.html ]. In the above picture, Polaris [ http://www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/hr/0424.html ] is the brightest star on the right, above the fleeting streak of a Perseid meteor [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap960809.html ]. The surface of Polaris slowly pulsates [ http://adsbit.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-iarticle_query?1994PASP..106..964B ], causing the star to change its brightness by a few percent over the course of a few days. This rare Cepheid variability [ http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap960110.html ] of Polaris is, oddly enough, itself changing [ http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=1998AJ....116..936K ].
Mato Vega Fire, Colorado: Na …
nasa, nasanaturalhazards
In the Sangre de Cristo Moun …
Boulder.TMO2006171
mediatype IMAGE
mediatype image
date 2006-06-20
creator NASA -- NASA Image Of The Day
identifier Boulder.TMO2006171
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