![]() sig09-002 04.20.09 Emission from the White Dwarf System GD 16This chart shows the brightness and wavelength of the radiation coming from white dwarf GD 16 and its associated disk... view image |
![]() ssc2009-09a 04.07.09 Cool Stars May Have Different Prebiotic Chemical MixNASA's Spitzer Space Telescope detected a prebiotic, or potentially life-forming, molecule called hydrogen cyanide (H... view image |
![]() ssc2009-09b 04.07.09 Chemical Soups Around Cool StarsThis artist's conception shows a young, hypothetical planet around a cool star. A soupy mix of potentially life-formi... view image |
![]() ssc2009-01b 01.05.09 Asteroid 'Bites the Dust' Around Dead StarNASA's Spitzer Space Telescope set its infrared eyes upon the dusty remains of shredded asteroids around several dead... view image |
![]() sig08-017 12.16.08 Devastated Stellar NeighborhoodThis image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the nasty effects of living near a group of massive stars: radia... view image |
![]() ssc2008-20a 11.11.08 Quartz-like Crystals Found in Planetary DisksThis artists concept of a young star and its planet forming disk shows tiny quartz like crystals detected by the Spit... view image |
![]() ssc2008-19b 10.27.08 Young Solar System in the MakingThis artist's diagram compares the Epsilon Eridani system to our own solar system. The two systems are structured sim... view image |
![]() ssc2008-19a 10.27.08 Epsilon Eridani: Double the RubbleThis artist's conception shows the closest known planetary system to our own, called Epsilon Eridani. Observations fr... view image |
![]() sig08-012 09.18.08 HH 221: Laser-Sharp Jet Splits WaterA jet of gas firing out of a very young star can be seen ramming into a wall of material in this infrared image from ... view image |
![]() ssc2008-08a 05.28.08 Ghostly Ring Around a MagnetarThis image shows a ghostly ring extending seven light-years across around the corpse of a massive star. The collapsed... view image |
![]() ssc2008-06b 03.13.08 Water Vapor in the Young Planetary Disk of AS 205NThis plot of infrared data shows the strong signature of water vapor in the disk of gas and dust surrounding a young ... view image |
![]() ssc2008-06a 03.13.08 A Young Stellar Disk around AA TauriThis plot of infrared data shows the signatures of water vapor and simple organic molecules in the disk of gas and du... view image |
![]() sig08-002 01.09.08 Accretion Disk Around Binary Star System WZ SgeAn artist's concept of the accretion disk around the binary star system WZ Sge. Using data from Kitt Peak National Ob... view image |
![]() ssc2007-19a 11.29.07 Spinning Top StarA rare, infrared view of a developing star and its flaring jets taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope (right) shows... view image |
![]() sig07-023 11.28.07 Planets Forming Around a Sun-like StarThis is an artist's rendition of the one-million-year-old star system called UX Tau A, located approximately 450 ligh... view image |
![]() sig07-022 11.08.07 Bubbly Little Star: HH 46/47A new image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows a baby star 1,140 light-years away from Earth blowing two massi... view image |
![]() sig07-019 10.03.07 Birth of an Earth-like PlanetThis artist's conception shows a binary-star, or two-star, system, called HD 113766, where astronomers suspect a rock... view image |
![]() ssc2007-14d 08.29.07 Planet-Forming Disk Around a Baby StarThis artist's concept shows a young star surrounded by a dusty protoplanetary disk. This disk contains the raw materi... view image |
![]() ssc2007-14c 08.29.07 Steamy Solar SystemThis diagram illustrates the earliest journeys of water in a young, forming star system. view image |
![]() ssc2007-08c 04.18.07 Evaporating Protoplanetary DiskYoung, cooler stars like our sun can form in the danger zones around scorching hot stars, called O-stars. The closer ... view image |
![]() sig07-005 04.17.07 Spitzer Digs Up Hidden Stars in a Dark Molecular CloudTwo rambunctious young stars are destroying their natal dust cloud with powerful jets of radiation, in an infrared co... view image |
![]() ssc2007-05b 03.27.07 Solar System with Snug SunsThis artist's concept depicts a faraway solar system like our own except for one big difference. Planets and asteroi... view image |
![]() ssc2007-05a 03.27.07 Where Planets Take up ResidenceThis diagram illustrates that mature planetary systems like our own might be more common around twin, or binary, star... view image |
![]() ssc2007-03a 02.12.07 Comets Kick Up Dust in Helix NebulaThis infrared image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the Helix nebula, a cosmic starlet often photographed b... view image |
![]() sig07-001 01.09.07 Forecasting Weather on Distant WorldsAn artist's concept shows a gas-giant planet orbiting very close to its parent star, creating searingly hot condition... view image |
![]() sig07-003 01.09.07 Luminous Blue Variable HD168625: Destined To Be a Supernova?A Luminous Blue Variable star, HD168625, is surrounded by a bipolar nebula that is similar to the one around SN1987A.... view image |
![]() sig06-023 10.03.06 A Star's Close EncounterThe potential planet-forming disk (or "protoplanetary disk") of a sun-like star is being violently ripped away by the... view image |
![]() sig06-022 09.18.06 Brown Dwarf CompanionThis is an artist's concept of the star HD 3651 as it is orbited by a close-in Saturn-mass planetary companion and th... view image |
![]() ssc2006-15a 07.24.06 Stars Can't Spin Out of ControlThis artist's concept shows a dusty planet-forming disk in orbit around a whirling young star. NASA's Spitzer Space T... view image |
![]() sig06-014 05.22.06 Stellar JetsThis artist concept illustrates jets of material shooting out from the neutron star in the interacting binary system ... view image |
![]() ssc2006-10b 04.05.06 Stellar Rubble May Be Planetary Building BlocksThis artist's concept depicts a type of dead star called a pulsar and the surrounding disk of rubble discovered by NA... view image |
![]() ssc2006-10a 04.05.06 Circle of AshesThis plot tells astronomers that a pulsar, the remnant of a stellar explosion, is surrounded by a disk of its own ash... view image |
![]() ssc2006-10c 04.05.06 Extreme PlanetsThis artist's concept depicts a planetary system discovered by Aleksander Wolszczan in 1992 around a pulsar. view image |
![]() ssc2006-05b 02.08.06 Supersized DiskThis illustration compares the size of a gargantuan star and its surrounding dusty disk (top) to that of our solar sy... view image |
![]() ssc2006-05a 02.08.06 Little Dust Grains in Giant Stellar DisksThis graph of data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the composition of a monstrous disk of what may be plane... view image |
![]() ssc2006-04b 01.11.06 Comet 'Bites the Dust' Around Dead StarThis artist's concept illustrates a comet being torn to shreds around a white dwarf called G29-38. NASA's Spitzer Spa... view image |
![]() sig06-001 01.10.06 Circumbinary DiskThis artist concept shows a debris disk in a cataclysmic variable system which consists of a highly magnetic white dw... view image |
![]() ssc2005-26b 12.20.05 Portrait of Our Dusty PastThis artist's concept illustrates a solar system that is a much younger version of our own. Dusty disks, like the one... view image |
![]() ssc2005-26a 12.20.05 Life's Starting Materials Found in Dusty DiskThis graph, or spectrum, from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope tells astronomers that some of the most basic ingredient... view image |
![]() sig05-027 12.14.05 Belt of DustA narrow asteroid belt filled with rocks and dusty debris, orbits a star similar to our own Sun when it was approxima... view image |