For Release: February 21, 2006

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has observed a rare population of colliding galaxies whose entangled hearts are wrapped in tiny crystals resembling crushed glass.

Among the thousands of top interdisciplinary scientists, policy makers, journalists, and general science enthusiasts who are gathering in St. Louis, Mo. from February 16-20 for the 2006 American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting is Spitzer Space Telescope Project Scientist Dr. Michael Werner.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has identified two huge "hypergiant" stars circled by monstrous disks of what might be planet-forming dust. The findings surprised astronomers because stars as big as these were thought to be inhospitable to planets.

When Doreen Spitzer learned that her son was going to visit the science center named after her late husband, Dr. Lyman Spitzer, Jr., she asked for two things: a Spitzer Space Telescope calendar and a comprehensive report of the visit.

Dr. Edward Tedesco may not play a musical instrument and has yet to release an album, but that does not mean he isn't a "rock star."

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has spotted what may be comet dust sprinkled around the white dwarf star G29-38, which died approximately 500 million years ago.

A new infrared mosaic from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope offers a stunning view of the stellar hustle and bustle that takes place at our Milky Way galaxy's center. The picture shows throngs of mostly old stars, on the order of hundreds of thousands, amid fantastically detailed clouds of glowing dust lit up by younger, massive stars.

Call it the Bermuda Triangle of our Milky Way Galaxy: a tiny patch of sky that has been known for years to be the source of the mysterious blasts of X-rays and gamma rays. Now, a team of astronomers, led by Don Figer of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Md., has solved the mystery by identifying one of the most massive star clusters in the galaxy. The little-known cluster, which has not been catalogued, is about 20 times more massive than typical star clusters in our galaxy, and appears to be the source of the powerful outbursts.

The Helix Nebula (NGC 7293) is a challenging stargazing target for amateur astronomers. It is one of the closest planetary nebulas -- a type of nebula formed from gas ejected by a dying sunlike star. Yet it is so large and spread out in the sky that it appears very dim in a telescope eyepiece. Long-exposure photographs unveil the true beauty of this celestial wonder. A new portrait of the Helix Nebula, created by the penetrating infrared gaze of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, is being released today at the 207th meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

The "Christmas Tree Cluster" has been seen sporting a shiny new decoration: an ornament made of newborn stars! But like a gift-wrapped package, these newborn stars are hiding behind thick branches of cosmic dust, only revealed in this spectacular new image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. Astronomers say this stellar ornament represents the best laboratory to date for studying the physics of star formation.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has discovered some of life's most basic ingredients in the dust swirling around a young star. The ingredients -- gaseous precursors to DNA and protein -- were detected in the star's terrestrial planet zone, a region where rocky planets such as Earth are thought to be born.

Astronomers have at last found inner light! Only, they didn't find it through the typical Earthly methods of meditation, exercise and therapy. Instead, the light was discovered inside our Milky Way galaxy after hours of deep self-reflection with NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

After more than a year of training workshops, writing proposals, observing, and analyzing data, 12 middle and high school science teachers will culminate months of hard work with a booth presentation at astronomy's version of the Olympics, the American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting, next month in Washington DC.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope is bringing new light -- infrared light -- to the study of our dark and mysterious universe. Some of the observatory's most exciting discoveries will be discussed in free public lectures on Thursday, Dec. 8 and Friday, Dec. 9.

When galaxies collide (as our galaxy, the Milky Way, eventually will with the nearby Andromeda galaxy), what happens to matter that gets spun off in the collision's wake?

Planets are everywhere these days. They have been spotted around more than 150 stars, and evidence is growing that they also circle "failed," or miniature, stars called brown dwarfs. Now, astronomers using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope say they have found what may be planets-in-the-making in the strangest of places -- around a brown dwarf that itself is the size of a planet.

How many stars are currently forming in our Milky Way galaxy? How many of them are high-mass stars? These are questions a team of international astronomers will attempt to answer in a 417-hour galactic survey called MIPSGAL. Data from the project's first 200 hours of observations were just recently released to the astronomical community.

Located 1,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Perseus, a reflection nebula called NGC 1333 epitomizes the beautiful chaos of a dense group of stars being born. Most of the visible light from the young stars in this region is obscured by the dense, dusty cloud in which they formed. With NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, scientists can detect the infrared light from these objects. This allows a look through the dust to gain a more detailed understanding of how stars like our sun begin their lives.

A new image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope reveals billowing mountains of dust ablaze with the fires of stellar youth.

It's another sunny Tuesday morning in Southern California and a handful of infrared scientists have flocked to the roof of the Spitzer Science Center for this week's "First Seven Minutes" meeting.

Scientists using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope say they have detected light that may be from the earliest objects in the universe. If confirmed, the observation provides a glimpse of an era more than 13 billion years ago when, after the fading embers of the theorized Big Bang gave way to millions of years of pervasive darkness, the universe came alive.

Unsuspecting prey be warned! Hiding in the darkest corner of the constellation Circinus is a gigantic black widow spider waiting for its next meal. For decades, this galactic creepy crawler has remained largely invisible, cunningly escaping visible-light detection. At last, it has finally been caught by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope's dust-piercing, infrared eyes.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has spotted the very beginnings of what might become planets around the puniest of celestial orbs -- brown dwarfs, or "failed stars."

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has captured a stunning infrared view of Messier 31, the famous spiral galaxy also known as Andromeda.

Before it was discovered that gravity pulled comets across the sky, many peoples and cultures perceived these cosmic objects as bad omens or "big bullies." They were often blamed for plagues and wars on Earth. In movies this image of the bully comet is perpetuated as they are often portrayed as hard chunks of ice barreling towards Earth to aid in the extinction of humanity. Recently, with a little help from NASA'S Deep Impact Mission and the Spitzer Space Telescope, comet Tempel 1 was finally able to reveal the soft and fluffy side of comets, showing that they are more like cotton candy than massive bully boulders.

Two of NASA's Great Observatories, the Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes, have teamed up to "weigh" the stars in several distant galaxies. One of these galaxies, among the most distant ever seen, appears to be unusually massive and mature for its place in the young universe.

On August 23 and 25, NASA's Spitzer Spitzer Space Telescope looked toward the recently discovered planet beyond Pluto, identified as 2003UB313. The observations were scheduled after an earlier attempt failed due to an error by the Spitzer project team in processing the request. Spitzer measures the amount of heat given off by planets and other objects, enabling researchers to infer the overall size of the bodies. The results of the recent observations are currently being analyzed.

When Deep Impact smashed into comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005, it released the ingredients of our solar system's primordial "soup." Now, astronomers using data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and Deep Impact have analyzed that soup and begun to come up with a recipe for what makes planets, comets and other bodies in our solar system.

Four days after its launch on August 25, 2003, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope opened its infrared eyes for the first time and immediately performed beyond all expectations by providing the world with one of the deepest infrared images ever taken. Two years later, Spitzer continues to surpass expectations by uncovering a hidden universe teeming with warm stellar embryos, chaotic planet-forming disks, majestic galaxies, hidden black holes, remnants of dead stars, and much more.