Shows / NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
These podcasts are my discussion of NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day. These are brief (3-5 minute) audio summaries of the picture posted on NASA's Picture of the Day website: APOD. Video versions of these are available on YouTube. I use these as the introduction to each of my introductory astronomy classes. Students will be able to access them here to review what was discussed in class. I appreciate any comments or suggestions which can be sent to: wagnerastronomy@gmail.com.
Episodes
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 09 - The Galaxy, the Jet, and a Famous Black Hole
In today's image, we see the giant elliptical galaxy, M87. In addition, we see images of the central jets and the famous image from 2017 by the Event Horizon…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 08 - Visualization: A Black Hole Accretion Disk
In today's image, we see an animation which shows the central regions around a black hole including the accretion disk. The 15-second video allows us to look…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 07 - Black Hole Accreting with Jet
In today's image, we see an artist's conception of an event observed in 2014. A massive explosion was observed which has since been modeled as a star being…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 06 - A Total Solar Eclipse from Sliver to Ring
In today's image, we see time-lapse of the total solar eclipse of April 8 of this year. We will see the Moon appear in the lower right and move to full cover…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 05 - A Black Hole Disrupts a Passing Star
In today's image, we see an artist's conception of what would happen as a black hole tears apart a passing star. Once the material crosses the event horizon…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 04 - 3 ATs
In today's image, we see three Auxiliary Telescopes which are used with the VLT telescopes to simulate larger mirrors using interferometry. This allows…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 03 - Temperatures on WASP-43b
In today's image, we see an illustration of the orbit of the exoplanet WASP-43b. This is a nearby planet, less than 300 light years from Earth. It is an…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 02 - M100: A Grand Design Spiral Galaxy
In today's image, we see the spiral galaxy known as M100 - this is an example of what is called a grand design spiral galaxy for its majestic spiral arms. We…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 May 01 - IC 1795: The Fishhead Nebula
In today's image, we see the star forming region known as the Fishhead Nebula and also by its catalog designation of IC 1795. This region has been images using…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 30 - GK Per: Nova and Planetary Nebula
In today's image, we see GK Per which was seen to explode as a nova back in 1901. A nova occurs when material builds up on the surface of a white dwarf star…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 29 - Comet, Planet, Moon
In today's image, we see the comet known as Pons-Brooks which has no rounded the Sun and is beginning its journey back to the outer solar system. In addition…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 28 - Rings Around the Ring Nebula
In today's image, we see a very deep image of the Ring Nebula as observed by multiple large telescopes. This allows for the imaging of fainter rings around the…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 27 - All Sky Moon Shadow
In today's image, we see an all sky image of the eclipse of April 8. The outer portion shows the horizon while the central circular region shows the entire sky…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 26 - Regulus and the Dwarf Galaxy
In today's image, we see the bright star Regulus which is the brightest star in the constellation of Leo. We see almost all stars as points of light because of…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 25 - NGC 604: Giant Stellar Nursery
In today's image, we see a large star forming region in the galaxy M33: The Triangulum Galaxy. This is one of the spiral galaxies in our own Local Group of…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 24 - Dragon's Egg Bipolar Emission Nebula
In today's image, we see an example of an emission nebula around a hot massive star. The ultraviolet light from the star excites the gases around it and causes…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 23 - Contrail Shadow X
In today's image, we see two contrails from airplanes that cross in the sky. Because of the positioning of the Sun and upper clouds, we also see the shadows…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 22 - Moon and Smoke Rings over Mt. Etna
In today's image, we see a thin waning crescent moon in the sky over Mt. Etna. We also see smoke rings from the volcano - this is a rare effect that occurs…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 21 - Perijove 16: Passing Jupiter
In today's image, we see a time-lapse video clip from the Juno spacecraft as it made its 16 close approach to the planet Jupiter. Juno has a highly elliptical…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 20 - Diamonds in the Sky
In today's image, we see several images of the total solar eclipse which occurred on April 8. The central page showing details of the solar corona only visible…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 19 - The Great Carina Nebula
In today's image, we see the Great Carina Nebula which is a large star forming region about 7500 light years from Earth - it is much larger than the closer…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 18 - Facing NGC 1232
In today's image, we see the spiral galaxy NGC 1232. We see this in a face-on position which gives us a great view of its spiral arms. We can see the pink…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 17 - Total Eclipse and Comets
In today's image, we see the total solar eclipse of April 8. Also visible in the sky and shown in this image were two planets - Venus and Mercury. Two comets…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 16 - Filaments of the Vela Supernova Remnant
In today's image, we see a portion of the Vela Supernova Remnant. This is the remnant of a star that would have been seen to explode here on Earth over ten…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 15 - The Cigar Galaxy from Hubble and Webb
In today's image, we see two images of M82 also known as the Cigar Galaxy. This is a starburst galaxy which is undergoing a burst of star formation due to an…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 14 - How a Total Solar Eclipse Ended
In today's image, we see a video clip showing the end of the total solar eclipse of April 8 of this year. As the video starts, we can see a couple of…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 13 - Palm Tree Partial Eclipse
In today's image, we see multiple images of the eclipse of April 8. These are projected through the leaves of a palm tree which acts as a bunch of pinhole…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 12 - Total Totality
In today's image, we see multiple images of the solar eclipse from April 8. Around the limb of the Moon, we see a number of pink solar prominences as well as…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 11 - Eclipse in Seven
In today's image, we see seven images from the solar eclipse of April 8. Starting from the upper left shortly after the Moon first started to cover the Sun…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 10 - Planets Around a Solar Eclipse
In today's image, we see two planets - one on either side of the eclipsed Sun. To the right is the planet Venus, currently visible in the morning sky just…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 09 - Moon's Shadow over Lake Magog
In today's image, we see the total solar eclipse which occurred yesterday over parts of North America. The solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes in front…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 08 - The Changing Ion Tail of Comet Pons-Brooks
In today's image, we see images of comet Pons-Brooks as observed over nine days in March of this year. We can see the distinct changes that have occurred in…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 07 - Total Solar Eclipse over Wyoming
In today's image, we see images from the total solar eclipse of 2017. We can view the progression as the Moon covers more and more of the Sun until it is…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 06 - Unwinding M51
In today's image, we see the spiral galaxy known as M51. In this image, the spiral arms have been digitally modified to unwind them using logarithms. The…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 05 - The Solar Corona Unwrapped
In today's image, we see two images of the corona of the Sun stretched out so they can be easily compared to one another. On the top is an image from the solar…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 04 - Comet Pons-Brooks at Night
In today's image, we see comet Pons-Brooks at it was seen on March 30. The comet is approaching its perihelion or closest approach to the Sun on April 21. In…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 03 - Unusual Nebula Pa 30
In today's image, we see the remnant left behind by a star which was observed to explode back in the year 1181. This appears to be an unusual type of nebula…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 02 - Detailed View of a Solar Eclipse Corona
In today's image, we see the corona of our Sun. This is the atmosphere of the Sun and is normally invisible because of the brightness of the Sun itself…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 April 01 - Swirling Magnetic Field around Our Galaxy's Central Black Hole
In today's image, we see an image from the Event Horizon Telescope which allows astronomers to image the regions around the central black holes of galaxies…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 31 - Total Solar Eclipse Below the Bottom of the World
In today's image, we see a total eclipse of the Sun observed from an airplane in 2021. Sometimes the eclipses occur at points on Earth that are not easy…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 30 - Medieval Astronomy from Melk Abbey
In today's image, we see a page of astronomy lecture notes dating back to 1490. The upper diagrams show the explanation of the occurrence of eclipses under the…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 29 - Galileo's Europa
In today's image, we see one of the four large moons of Jupiter, known as Europa. This is the smallest of the Galilean moons of Jupiter, but actually has more…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 28 - Millions of Stars in Omega Centauri
In today's image, we see the globular star cluster known as Omega Centauri. Globular star clusters exist in the spherical halo of our galaxy. Omega Centauri…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 27 - The Coma Cluster of Galaxies
In today's image, we see a large, dense galaxy cluster known as the Coma Cluster. The cluster contains thousands of galaxies and is so large that it can take…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 26 - Comet Pons-Brooks' Ion Tail
In today's image, we see the comet known as Pons-Brooks. This comet returns to the inner solar system every 71 years and has been observed since the 14th…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 25 - Sonified: The Jellyfish Nebula Supernova Remnant
In today's image, we see a video where the tones the sound are used to represent different colors in the image. The red colors are represented by the lower…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 Match 24 - Looking Back at an Eclipsed Earth
In today's image, we see the shadow of our Moon as cast on the Earth during the total solar eclipse from 1999. The very center region of this shadow will be…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 23 - Ares 3 Landing Site: The Martian Revisited
In today's image, we see the region around the landing site of the fictional Ares 3 craft which was the basis of the novel: The Martian in which an astronaut…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 22 - Phobos: Moon over Mars
In today's image, we see the planet Mars with its moon, Phobos just appearing in multiple images off the left-hand side. Phobos is an unusual moon in that it…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 21 - The Leo Trio
In today's image, we see the Leo Triplet - a group of spiral galaxies in the direction of the constellation of Leo the lion. The galaxies appear relatively…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 20 - The Eyes in Markarian's Galaxy Chain
In today's image, we see two galaxy which have recently interacted. We can see how the one galaxy contains material that has been distorted as the…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 19 - A Picturesque Equinox Sunset
In today's image, we see the Sun setting at the end of a road. This road runs roughly east-west so the Sun will appear to rise and set at the end of the road…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 18 - Comet Pons-Brooks' Swirling Coma
In today's image, we see an image of Comet Pons-Brooks. The coma is highlighted to show the swirling pattern around it. It is thought this might be caused by…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 17 - NGC 7714: Starburst after Galaxy Collision
In today's image, we see galaxies in the process of colliding. The collision will allow large gas clouds to merge and compress, causing star formation rates to…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 16 - ELT and the Milky Way
In today's image, we see the ongoing construction of the ELT - Extremely Large Telescope. This is expected to be completed later this decade and will be a…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 15 - Portrait of NGC 1055
In today's image, we see the galaxy known as NGC 1055. The is a spiral type galaxy as we see it edge-on with the dark dust lane concentrated in the disk…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 14 - Moon Pi and Mountain Shadow
In today's image, we see the full moon as it rises over the horizon. The full moon is always directly opposite to the Sun in the sky which makes it 180 degrees…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 13 - The Seagull Nebula
In today's image, we see the Seagull Nebula. This is an example of an emission nebula which glows red with the light of hydrogen gas that has been excited by…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 12 - A Galaxy-Shaped Rocket Exhaust Spiral
In today's image, we see the exhaust from a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launch. Because of the high winds, the exhaust was twisted into a spiral pattern here. In…
- NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
2024 March 11 - A Full Plankton Moon
In today's image, we see multiple images of the full moon as it descends toward the horizon. Because the image was taken near Earth's equator, it descends…