1. Hubble Space Telescope Advent Calendar
Happy New Year 2015, and Peace For All!
HST Images Source: www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2014/12/2014-hubble-space-telescope-advent-calendar/100863

2. "Mystic Mountain,” a pillar of gas and dust 3 LY tall, located within the Carina Nebula, which
in turn is located 7,5 KLy away in the southern constellation of Carina.
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3. The Ring Nebula is the glowing remains of a once sun-like star. The nebula measures ~ 1 Ly
across, and is ~ 2 KLy away, in constellation Lyra. The white dot in the center of the nebula is a
white dwarf.
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4. The Sombrero Galaxy, ~ 28 MLy away, 50 KLy across, is one of the brightest galaxies visible from
Earth, just beyond the limit of naked-eye visibility. The central bulge harbors ~ 2,000 globular star
clusters, 10 times as many as orbit the Milky Way.
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5. Sharpless 2-106 is several Ly across, 2 KLy away, in the Milky Way. A massive young star creates
the furious activity seen inside the nebula. Twin lobes of glowing blue super-hot gas, stretch
outward from the central star.
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6. Hoag's Object, a galaxy 600 MLy away in the constellation Serpens. It is ~ 120 KLy wide, larger
than the Milky Way. The gap may contain star clusters too faint to see. The blue ring of stars may
be the remains of a galaxy that passed nearby ~ 2 to 3 GYA.
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7. UGC 1810 is distorted into a rose-like shape by the gravitational pull of the galaxy below, UGC
1813. The interacting pair (called Arp 273), lies in the constellation Andromeda,~ 300 MLy away.
The two galaxies are separated by tens of KLy.
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8. Galaxy ESO 137-001 is moving at ~ 7.2 Gm/h toward the upper right of this image, between
other galaxies in the Norma cluster, > 200 MLy away. The galaxy remains intact due to its gravity.
Tattered threads of gas (the blue jellyfish-like tendrils) trail the galaxy.
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9. Galaxy Cluster Abell 2218. 2 GLy away, this cluster’s gravitational field deflects light passing
through it, like an optical lens bends light to form an image. Gravitational lensing magnifies,
brightens, and distorts images from faraway objects. The arc patterns in the image are distorted
views of galaxies 5-10 times farther away.
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10. The Retina Nebula, ~ .25 Ly wide, 1.9 KLy away, is material streaming outward from a dying star.
Viewed from the side, we see intricate tendrils of dust (compared to the eye's retina). Gas on
the inside is ionized by light from the central star, and glows.
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11. The Whirlpool Galaxy. A striking feature is its two curving arms (star-formation regions), which
begins with the dark clouds of gas on the inner edge, then moves to the bright pink regions, and
ends with the blue clusters along the outer edge. Hubble's clear view shows that NGC 5195 (the
smaller galaxy) is located along almost the same line-of-sight, but behind the Whirlpool.
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12. Star HD 44179, ~ 2.3 KLy away, in constellation Monoceros, is surrounded by a structure known
as the Red Rectangle, from its shape and its apparent colour when seen in early images from
Earth. This image shows that it is shaped like an X. The star at the center is similar to the sun,
but at the end of its lifetime.
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13. Star Cluster Pismis 24, at the core of nebula NGC 6357, ~ 8 KLy away, is a gaseous nebula ionized
by the youngest (bluest) heavy stars. The UV radiation from the blazing stars heats the gas and
creates a bubble.
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14. The Cat's Eye Nebula, a “bull's eye” pattern of eleven or even more concentric rings, or shells.
Each "ring" is actually the edge of a spherical bubble seen projected onto the sky. Observations
suggest the star ejected its mass in a series of pulses at 1,500-year intervals.
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15. Spiral Galaxy Southern Pinwheel (M83). The vibrant magentas and blues reveal that it is ablaze
with star formation. It lies 15 MLy away in the constellation Hydra. This photo shows thousands
of star clusters, each with hundreds of thousands of individual stars.
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16. Uranus, with the shadow of its Ganymede moon, creating the illusion of a “pupil” in a 16 000-
km-diameter "eye“ (which is actually a gigantic and seemingly perpetual “storm”).
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17. A Star Factory in the Monkey Head Nebula, a collection of carved knots of gas and dust in a small
portion of the nebula, a roiling region located 6.4 KLy away. Massive, newly formed stars near
the center (and toward the bottom of this image) are blasting away at dust within. Ultraviolet
light from these bright stars helps carve the dust into giant pillars.
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18. A Celestial Spiral, known as IRAS 23166+1655, forming around the star LL Pegasi (also known as
AFGL 3068) in the constellation of Pegasus, one of the most perfect geometrical forms yet
discovered in space. shows what appears to be a thin regular spiral pattern winding around the
star (hidden behind thick dust). The pattern suggests a regular periodic origin for the shape.
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19. Inside the Orion Nebula, a cavern of roiling dust and gas where thousands of stars are forming.
More than 3,000 stars of various sizes appear in this image. The bright central region is the
home of the four largest, called the Trapezium. Ultraviolet light from these stars causes a cavity
in the nebula and disrupts the growth of hundreds of smaller stars.
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20. Dust Lanes in galaxy NGC 7049, in the southern sky constellation Indus. A family of globular
clusters appear as glittering spots dusted around the galaxy halo. The dust lanes, appearing as
a lacy web, are backlit by millions of stars in the galaxy halo.
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21. A rainbow in the Egg Nebula. Resembling a rippling pool illuminated by underwater lights, the
Egg offers astronomers a special look at the normally invisible dust shells swaddling an aging
star. These dust layers, extending over one-tenth of a light-year from the star, have an onionskin
structure that forms concentric rings around the star. The artificial "Easter-Egg" colors come
from polarizing filters, used to dissect how the light reflects.
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22. The dusty lanes of Centaurus A, also known as NGC 5128, lies from 10 to 16 MLy away from us.
This composite image shows features in the visible spectrum, as well as ultraviolet light from
young stars, and near-infrared light, which lets us see details otherwise obscured by dust.
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23. The Crab Nebula supernova remnant about 6.5 KLy away, centered around the Crab Pulsar,
a small and very dense neutron star (~ 1.5 times the mass of our sun) crunched into a
sphere only 20 km in diameter, spinning at 1,800 RPM. The Crab is believed to match up
with a supernova observed in the year 1054, by Chinese astronomers.
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24. Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1300, ~ 61 MLy away, is just slightly larger than the Milky Way, is con-
sidered typical of barred spirals. Blue and red supergiant stars, star clusters, and star-forming
regions are visible across the spiral arms, and many more distant galaxies are visible in the
background.
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25. “Light echoes” around V838 Monocerotis, a variable star ~ 20 KLy from Earth. This image from
2005 reveals dramatic changes in the illumination of surrounding dusty cloud structures. The
effect, called a light echo, has been unveiling never-before-seen dust patterns ever since the
star suddenly brightened for several weeks in early 2002.
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26. The Hubble Ultra Deep Field. Starting in 2003, the Hubble telescope was pointed toward a
relatively empty part of our sky, and in a series of sessions, built up an exposure of just under
1 million seconds, capturing thousands of extremely distant galaxies, some as far away as 13
GLy. Almost every bit of light in this image is a galaxy full of billions of star.
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27. HST 25 Years 1990 - 2015