Earlier TeoKosmos reports, ordered from newest to oldest.
NASA / James Webb Space Telescope
Webb Reveals Turbulent Activity in the Stellar Nursery NGC 7129
On October 6, 2026, NASA published a new view of NGC 7129, an active star-forming region about 3,300 light-years from Earth. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope revealed the hidden activity of young stars forming inside clouds of gas and dust.
The image shows powerful stellar jets, shock structures, and cavities carved by radiation and stellar winds from young stars. These observations help scientists better understand how stars are born and how they reshape the environment around them.
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has once again shown just how dramatic star birth can be. NGC 7129 is a stellar nursery where gas and dust both conceal young objects and preserve clues about their development. Thanks to Webb’s infrared sensitivity, astronomers were able to see structures that were previously partly or completely hidden behind dense clouds of dust.
The image reveals numerous young stars and protostars still in the process of forming. Some of them launch narrow streams of material known as stellar jets. When those fast outflows slam into the surrounding gas and dust, they create bright shock structures that highlight the intense activity within these young systems.
Webb also shows large cavities inside the nebula. These are carved out by radiation and stellar winds from hot young stars that are actively reshaping their surroundings. As a result, the region appears highly dynamic, with star birth and environmental change happening at the same time.
NASA notes that Webb’s new observations can be compared with earlier data from the Spitzer Space Telescope, but Webb provides a much more detailed view. That allows astronomers to better understand how stellar jets, radiation, and dusty clouds interact inside young star-forming regions.
These observations are important not only for understanding one nebula, but also for revealing broader processes of stellar evolution. Regions like NGC 7129 show how young stars grow, how they influence their surroundings, and how planetary systems may eventually emerge from similar clouds of gas and dust.
Source: NASA / James Webb Space Telescope. Original publication: NASA’s Webb Captures Commotion From Nebula’s Stellar Jets. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-captures-commotion-from-nebulas-stellar-jets/
Image Credit: Image: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI; Image Processing: Alyssa Pagan (STScI)
On October 3, 2026, NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day featured Curiosity at the southern rim of Vera Rubin Ridge. The panorama combines 61 separate exposures made by the rover’s Mars Hand Lens Imager, or MAHLI.
This is more than a portrait of the rover. It captures Curiosity’s progress up Mount Sharp and offers a view of Mars from the perspective of a machine that has been studying the planet’s surface for years.
The selfie was recorded on Curiosity’s sol 1943, a Martian day about 40 minutes longer than an Earth day. Frames containing the camera arm were removed while the mosaic was assembled, and the extended background was supplied by earlier Mastcam images. The result is a broad panorama with Curiosity standing against the Martian terrain.
Mount Sharp rises in the distance, although the rover’s ChemCam housing partly blocks the distant five-kilometre-high peak. NASA notes that on August 26, 2026, Curiosity reached a total elevation gain of one kilometre from the floor of Gale Crater up the slope of Mount Sharp.
The image is a striking visual summary of the mission: one rover, many carefully combined frames, and a long record of movement across the Martian landscape.
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, October 3, 2026. Original publication: Selfie at Vera Rubin Ridge. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-october-3-selfie-at-vera-rubin-ridge/
Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS - Panorama: Andrew Bodrov
Webb Finds Signs of Collisions That Can Shatter Young Worlds
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has examined young stellar systems containing unusually large amounts of warm dust. New observations indicate that some of this material may have been produced by extremely energetic collisions between large planetary embryos.
These violent events may help astronomers understand how rocky planets formed — and what may have happened in our own solar system billions of years ago.
Young planetary systems can be far more chaotic than they appear. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has helped astronomers investigate a special class of young systems known as extreme debris disks. These environments contain unusually large amounts of warm dust close to their stars, in regions comparable to where rocky planets orbit in our own solar system.
Researchers assembled a sample of 21 extreme debris disks. Some had previously been observed by the Spitzer Space Telescope, while Webb’s new measurements allowed scientists to examine their composition in much greater detail. Webb and Spitzer used mid-infrared spectra to distinguish chemical signatures in the material. The observations showed that the disks can broadly be divided into silica-rich and silica-poor groups.
About one-third of the extreme debris disks in the sample are silica-rich. According to the researchers, this type of material can be produced during highly energetic collisions involving large planetary embryos roughly on the scale of Mars. Such impacts can heat rock so intensely that a substantial amount of material is vaporized before later forming clouds of fine debris and dust.
The silica-poor systems appear to reflect less energetic collisions. These may resemble grazing impacts between bodies roughly on the scale of the Moon. Webb cannot directly image these small planetary embryos, but their collisions leave chemical signatures in the dust surrounding their stars.
These observations are particularly important for understanding the early history of our own solar system. One leading model for the origin of the Moon proposes that a Mars-sized body known as Theia struck the young Earth. Material blasted into space during that enormous collision may later have come together to form the Moon.
NASA notes that extreme debris disks appear to be rare. Based on observations collected so far, detectable signatures of this phase may occur around only about one percent of young stars. In this study, silica-rich disks were found around stars younger than roughly 300 million years. That makes the sample of 21 systems especially valuable, allowing astronomers to study an entire class of violently evolving planetary systems rather than isolated examples.
The findings show that planet formation is not always a gentle process of gradual growth. Young worlds can collide, fragment, and reshape one another, while the debris created by those events may later become part of new planets and moons.
Source: NASA / James Webb Space Telescope. Original publication: NASA’s Webb Provides Crash Course on Planet-Shattering Collisions. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-provides-crash-course-on-planet-shattering-collisions/
Artwork: NASA, ESA, CSA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI)
On September 29, 2026, NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day featured Sh2-188, a planetary nebula known as the Shrimp Nebula. Its distinctive swirl spans a patch of sky roughly half the apparent diameter of the Moon.
At the centre is a white dwarf, the leftover core of a Sun-like star that shed its outer atmosphere. It is moving unusually fast through interstellar space, creating a bow shock that resembles the wave in front of a boat moving through water.
The image records light from hydrogen, sulfur and oxygen. Those signals reveal the nebula’s gas structures, while processing makes the details easier to see without changing the object itself.
Sh2-188 is interesting because its shape is connected not only to the star’s lost outer layers. As the white dwarf moves, gas at the leading edge is compressed and brightened, making one side of the nebula more prominent than the other. This gives the object its impression of a cosmic shrimp moving through the surrounding interstellar medium.
A planetary nebula is not a planet. It is a shell of gas released near the end of a medium-mass star’s life. The hot, dense core remains in the centre while the surrounding gas slowly disperses. In Sh2-188, the core’s rapid motion adds an asymmetric, almost spiral-like structure to that shell.
The featured image was taken with a backyard telescope in Krakow, Poland, using hydrogen, sulfur and oxygen filters. It was then digitally adjusted to approximate the nebula’s true colours.
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, September 29, 2026. Original publication: Sh2-188: The Shrimp Nebula. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-29-sh2-188-the-shrimp-nebula/
Image Credit & Copyright: Pawel Piechnik
Andromeda Before and After Processing: What the Camera Really Sees
On September 27, 2026, NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day showed the Andromeda Galaxy, M31, before and after a series of astronomical images was processed. It is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way, yet even a long exposure of it can look remarkably messy at first.
The raw dataset was a stack of 223 images, each a 300-second exposure. They were taken in 2019 from a garden observatory in Portugal, so the frames contain airplane trails, satellite trails, cosmic-ray streaks and bad pixels.
The finished result does not create a fake galaxy. Processing removes terrestrial and detector artifacts so the real structure of M31 becomes easier to see.
Raw astrophotographs often look untidy because a camera records more than the light of the distant target. During a long exposure, an airplane or satellite can cross the field of view, while a high-energy particle can leave a short bright streak. Individual pixels can also behave incorrectly and produce persistent dots or patches.
That is why astronomers take many frames and combine them into a stack. The signal from M31 repeats in the same place, while random trails and noise change from frame to frame. Comparing the images allows software to reduce those disturbances and preserve details that are present in the real sky.
This project used Astro Pixel Processor, DeepSkyStacker and PixInsight. Their role was not simply pressing a single “Photoshop” button: calibration, alignment, stacking and later adjustments are separate stages of working with data. Responsible processing should make clear what was changed and why.
An airplane or satellite trail belongs to an event near Earth, not to M31. A cosmic ray is not part of the distant galaxy, and a bad pixel is not a new star. Removing them from a finished image does not mean that researchers are drawing Andromeda into existence. It separates the target’s signal from known measurement artifacts.
Andromeda is about 2.5 million light-years away. The light reaching a telescope today began its journey long before modern human civilisation. Despite that distance, M31 is a large and bright galaxy that can appear to the unaided eye on a dark sky as a faint, misty patch.
That makes M31 an ideal example of the difference between raw data and a finished astronomical image. The first version shows the full observation chain, including its imperfections; the second shows the same real galaxy after controlled cleaning and enhancement of its structure. Processing does not replace observation. It helps us read the observation more clearly.
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, September 27, 2026. Original publication: Andromeda before Photoshop. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-27-andromeda-before-photoshop/
Additional source: NASA Science — APOD: Andromeda Before and After Photoshop: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-27-andromeda-before-photoshop/
Image used for TeoKosmos: official NASA Science asset Andromeda Galaxy M31: https://science.nasa.gov/image-detail/m31-2/
Image credit: NASA, ESA, J. Dalcanton, B.F. Williams, L.C. Johnson (University of Washington), the PHAT team, and R. Gendler.
Omega Centauri: A Star Cluster That Preserves the Milky Way’s History
On September 25, 2026, NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day featured the globular star cluster Omega Centauri, also known as NGC 5139. It contains about 10 million stars packed into a volume roughly 150 light-years across.
Omega Centauri lies approximately 15,000 light-years from Earth. It is the largest and brightest of roughly 200 known globular clusters associated with the halo of the Milky Way.
Unlike many globular clusters, Omega Centauri contains several stellar populations with different ages and chemical abundances. That unusual mixture suggests it may be the remnant core of a smaller galaxy that merged with the Milky Way long ago.
Omega Centauri is more than a huge gathering of old stars. It is a kind of archive of our Galaxy’s past. Its unusual internal structure helps astronomers study how stellar systems formed and how the Milky Way grew through ancient mergers.
Globular clusters are densely packed spheres in which stars are held together by their shared gravity. With about 10 million stars in one object, Omega Centauri’s central regions are far more crowded than the neighbourhood around our Sun. Yet the stars are still so distant that, from Earth, the cluster appears as a glowing, grainy sphere rather than as a collection of individually visible worlds.
Omega Centauri has another important distinction. In many globular clusters, the stars are close to the same age and share similar chemical compositions because they formed together from one cloud. In Omega Centauri, astronomers find multiple populations with different ages and chemical abundances. Its history therefore appears to be more complicated than a single episode of star formation.
One leading explanation is that Omega Centauri is the surviving core of a smaller galaxy. As that galaxy interacted and merged with the Milky Way, its outer stars and gas may have been stripped away, while its dense central core remained as a distinct globular cluster. This scenario is not the only possible interpretation, but it helps explain the object’s unusual combination of properties.
Long-term observations with the Hubble Space Telescope have also found evidence for a massive black hole near the centre of Omega Centauri. Astronomers study the motions of stars in the most crowded central region: their speeds and paths can reveal the influence of unseen mass. The measurement is difficult because many stars are projected close together in the same small area of sky.
If further observations confirm the black hole, Omega Centauri could provide an important link between star clusters and galactic nuclei. It may help researchers understand how black holes and dense stellar systems survive and evolve during galaxy mergers.
The official NASA Science image used for this article comes from the Hubble archive. It shows Omega Centauri, or NGC 5139, as a dense field of stars in the constellation Centaurus. Combining data from several filters produces the colour view and helps reveal the cluster’s stellar structure.
Omega Centauri matters not only because of its enormous population of stars. It preserves clues about events that took place around the Milky Way billions of years ago. By studying its stars, astronomers can reconstruct the history of an ancient small galaxy, investigate the properties of the Milky Way’s halo and test models of how our Galaxy grew.
Source: NASA Science / Astronomy Picture of the Day. Original publication: Globular Star Cluster Omega Centauri. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-25-globular-star-cluster-omega-centauri/
Image credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team. Official NASA Science asset: https://science.nasa.gov/asset/hubble/omega-centauri/
On September 23, 2026, NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day featured a new lunar crater named McGetchin — the mark of a cosmic impact discovered by comparing images of the Moon’s surface before and after the event.
The crater formed between April and May 2024 when an asteroid or comet roughly the size of a humpback whale struck the Moon. It spans about two football fields, and impacts of this scale are expected only about once every 132 years.
Follow-up thermal observations revealed a broad cold spot around the crater. The impact loosened the lunar regolith, making it less able to retain heat at night. The new APOD shows how orbital data can reveal changes across the Moon’s surface.
On September 23, 2026, NASA presented the new lunar crater McGetchin in Astronomy Picture of the Day. It was named after Apollo-era lunar scientist Tom McGetchin. The crater became visible through systematic observations by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been photographing the Moon from orbit for more than a decade.
The LRO team compared images of the same region taken before and after the event. In the older image set, the surface appeared ordinary. In the newer frames, a bright area of ejected material appeared around a dark halo. The crater lies at the center of this disturbed zone and measures about 728 feet across, roughly the length of two football fields.
The impact occurred sometime between April 11 and May 22, 2024. NASA estimates that the object that hit the Moon may have been about 10–20 metres across, comparable in size to a humpback whale. Because the Moon has no atmosphere to slow or break apart an incoming object, space rocks reach its surface directly.
McGetchin is more than a new depression in the lunar ground. The impact blasted regolith — the loose layer of dust, fragments and crushed rock that covers the Moon — outward from the site. Some of this material spread across the surrounding terrain, creating a distinctive pattern visible in broad orbital maps.
After the crater was discovered, scientists also used thermal data from the Diviner instrument. They found a cold area about four miles wide around the crater. At night, this region is about 16 degrees Fahrenheit cooler than its surroundings. Loosened regolith is less dense and does not retain heat as effectively, so the impact’s effects extend well beyond the visible crater.
The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter regularly monitors the Moon and helps identify changes on its surface. During the mission, the team has identified at least 1,000 new impact craters, while roughly 100,000 additional surface changes have been flagged for further study. Most of these marks are very small, but McGetchin stood out because of its size and the clear halo of impact debris around it.
To find large new craters, researchers compare global lunar maps made at different times. Software highlights areas that have changed, but specialists must verify each candidate because lighting, shadows and viewing angles can create false signals. In McGetchin’s case, the characteristic bright pattern around a dark region proved to be the signature of a recent impact.
The discovery helps scientists understand how often large objects strike the Moon and how they alter not only the impact point but also the surrounding soil. The lunar surface preserves such events far longer than Earth does, where wind, water and geological activity gradually erase the traces of impacts.
The new APOD presents the Moon as a dynamic world, even though its surface can appear unchanged at first glance. With long-term LRO observations, researchers can compare different eras, find fresh craters and study how impacts change the properties of regolith. McGetchin is a rare example of an event that humanity has been able to record on a nearly geological timescale.
Source: NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day, September 23, 2026. Original publication: A New Lunar Crater: McGetchin. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-23-the-mcgetchin-crater/
Additional source: NASA Science — NASA’s Moon Orbiter Spots New, “Once-in-Century” Moon Crater: https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/moon/nasas-moon-orbiter-spots-new-once-in-century-moon-crater/
Image credit: NASA/GSFC/Intuitive Machines.
Perseverance Reveals a Complex Water History on Early Mars
NASA has reported a new study of the Margin Unit, a geologic area along the inner edge of Jezero Crater. Data from the Perseverance rover show that its rocks interacted with water at least three separate times, preserving a far more complicated history than orbital observations had suggested.
Scientists expected mostly sedimentary rocks because the Margin Unit follows the shore of an ancient Martian lake. Instead, Perseverance found igneous rock that cooled slowly deep underground before later water-related processes altered it.
The first identified episode involved carbon-dioxide-rich groundwater reacting with olivine and leaving carbonate-filled fractures in the bedrock. A second water encounter may have been connected to the lake that once occupied Jezero. In lower parts of the unit, the team also found more silica, another clue to ancient aqueous chemistry.
Later, heated groundwater created mineral veins containing calcium sulfate and fluorite. Fluorite commonly forms when hot water circulates through volcanic rock, so its presence points to a further hydrothermal stage in the region’s history.
Perseverance made the measurements with SuperCam, an instrument on the rover’s mast. It has examined more than 185 bedrock targets across the unit: its laser produces a tiny plasma at a distance, and the resulting spectrum reveals a target’s mineral composition. That allowed the team to reconstruct the sequence of events, although the precise age of each event remains unknown.
The finding matters to the search for ancient habitable environments on Mars. Carbonates and silica can preserve records of past conditions, and water reacting with olivine can create chemical energy sources for microbes on Earth. The study is not evidence of life, but it refines where and under what conditions signs of past life might have been preserved. Original NASA JPL publication: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-discovery-reveals-complex-water-systems-on-early-mars/
Cocoon Nebula: NASA Highlights a Stellar Nursery With a Dusty Tail Nearly 100 Light-Years Long
NASA Science highlighted a new wide-field view of the Cocoon Nebula, IC 5146, on September 21. Located in the constellation Cygnus, this compact star-forming region appears alongside an enormous complex of dark interstellar dust, giving the entire scene the appearance of a cosmic comet.
The bright central head of the Cocoon Nebula spans about 10 light-years, while its dark dusty tail stretches for nearly 100 light-years. The entire complex lies approximately 2,500 light-years from Earth.
Some of the most interesting activity is hidden inside the darkest regions. Thick dust filaments conceal young stars that are still forming within the cloud. The Cocoon Nebula therefore offers a striking view of one of the fundamental processes shaping the universe — the birth of new stars.
On September 21, 2026, NASA Science presented this broad view in Astronomy Picture of the Day, highlighting one of the most distinctive stellar nurseries in our Galaxy: the Cocoon Nebula, known in astronomical catalogs as IC 5146.
The object lies in Cygnus, approximately 2,500 light-years from Earth. In the wide-field image, the Cocoon looks especially unusual: a bright compact nebula sits at one end of a long, dark complex of interstellar dust. The shape makes the entire structure resemble a huge cosmic comet, with a bright head and an extended tail.
The bright central region spans about 10 light-years across. It shines through a combination of emission and reflection processes. Gas in the region responds to radiation from young, hot stars, while dust scatters their light and creates the intricate pattern of bright and dark areas.
Near the center of the Cocoon is a bright star that, according to the NASA APOD explanation, likely supplies much of the energy for the region. Its powerful radiation also helps clear the surrounding space, shaping a visible cavity within the gas and dust.
The Cocoon’s scale extends far beyond its luminous center. A long complex of dark interstellar dust stretches away from it, reaching nearly 100 light-years across the wide field. In visible light, this region appears dark because dense dust blocks light from stars behind or within the cloud.
These dark filaments are particularly important to astronomers. Hidden behind them are young stars still in the early stages of development. What appears in the photograph to be an empty dark area may actually be an active site where new stars are being born.
NASA has also studied the Cocoon with infrared observations from the WISE mission. In official NASA material, the region is described as a cloud of gas and dust surrounded by the dark Barnard 168 cloud. Infrared light can see through dust more effectively than ordinary visible light, helping reveal young stars hidden inside the nebula.
Combining observations at different wavelengths gives astronomers a more complete picture of what is happening in IC 5146. Visible light shows the dramatic interaction between illumination and dark dust, while infrared telescopes can look deeper into the cold, dense regions where stars are forming.
The new APOD publication shows not only the Cocoon itself but also its wider cosmic surroundings. The field of view spans more than two degrees of sky, allowing the long structure of the nebula and its surrounding dust clouds to be seen as one connected complex.
The image presented by NASA Science on September 21 was captured in July from Death Valley, California. The area’s dark night sky made it possible to record faint structures around IC 5146 and its extended dusty tail.
The Cocoon Nebula is a reminder that stars do not arise in empty space. Their birth begins inside cold molecular clouds, where gas and dust gradually contract under gravity. Over time, young stars form in the densest regions and begin to heat, illuminate, and reshape the environment around them.
That is the process we see in IC 5146: dark material conceals young stars, while already-formed luminous stars gradually transform the cloud from which they were born.
The wide view of the Cocoon demonstrates the scale of this process. A bright region roughly ten light-years across is only a small part of a system connected to a dusty tail nearly one hundred light-years long.
For astronomers, regions like this are natural laboratories for studying how cold interstellar material becomes new stars. For everyone else, the image is another reminder that even the darkest parts of space can hide active regions where new worlds are taking shape.
Source: NASA Science / Astronomy Picture of the Day. Original publication: Cocoon Nebula Wide Field. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-21-cocoon-nebula-wide-field/
Additional source: NASA Science Photojournal — Cosmic Cocoon. NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA: https://science.nasa.gov/photojournal/cosmic-cocoon/
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA.
NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day shows zodiacal light, a faint luminous band also known as the false dawn, across a dark night sky.
The image was recorded just before astronomical twilight during a September star party at the Hanle Dark Sky Reserve in Ladakh, India, at about 4,500 metres above sea level.
Meteors streak through the sky, while bright Jupiter appears near the eastern horizon. Follow the zodiacal band toward open cluster M44 and the yellowish Mars.
Serendipitous detections by NASA’s Juno spacecraft suggest Mars may be a source of interplanetary dust that scatters sunlight and creates zodiacal light.
Source: NASA APOD, September 19, 2026. Image credit & copyright: Neelam and Ajay Talwar (TWAN). Read the original: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-19-a-zodiacal-night/
The XRISM X-ray observatory captured a neutron star, GX 301‑2, gathering a stream of gas from a blue hypergiant companion. The observations help show how powerful X-ray flares arise.
In the BP Crucis binary system, the neutron star GX 301‑2 passes through a dense stream of gas that is continuously shed by its companion, the blue hypergiant Wray 977. Observations from the Japan-led XRISM mission allowed astronomers to trace the gas moving close to the pulsar.
From iron spectra, the team determined that plasma is falling toward the neutron star at about 540,000 kilometres per hour. As the pulsar captures the material, it heats up and emits X-rays. This is how powerful flares arise.
The data also indicate that the turbulent gas disk around the pulsar can break apart as the star moves deeper into the stream, then form again later — even rotating in the opposite direction. The results give astronomers a new way to test how neutron stars accrete material from massive companions.
Source: NASA, September 18, 2026. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/missions/xrism/xrism-sees-pulsar-gathering-companions-wind/
NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day presents a section of the Carina Nebula, an active star-forming region about 7,500 light-years from Earth. The James Webb Space Telescope captured a dust pillar shaped by interstellar gas and dust. Its distinctive form has earned it the nickname “the Treasure Chest.”
The feature is a cometary globule, an isolated cloud with a dense, dark head and a sweeping tail. Powerful stellar winds and radiation from nearby stars, including the exceptionally bright Eta Carinae system, are gradually eroding the cloud. The process excavates its upper edge and creates the appearance of an open lid.
A compact cluster of about 70 stars lies inside the pillar. The cluster is thought to be only about 1.3 million years old, and its young members include a massive star roughly 19 times the mass of the Sun. Such stars evolve quickly, shine intensely and reshape the environment where later generations of stars may form.
NASA published the feature on September 17, 2026. Image credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, M. Reiter; acknowledgement: M. H. Özsaraç. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/image-article/apod-2026-september-17-a-treasure-chest-in-the-carina-nebula/
NASA has released a large new view of IC 348, a star-forming region about 1,000 light-years away in the constellation Perseus. The James Webb Space Telescope reveals cold clouds of gas and dust, a bright young cluster, and narrow streams of material launched by newborn stars.
While studying IC 348, researchers identified brown dwarfs with masses as low as about twice that of Jupiter. They are the least massive known objects of their kind and challenge models of how stars and planets form.
The panorama is scientifically valuable as well as beautiful. It brings together dusty structures, protostars, Herbig–Haro objects and faint distant galaxies, helping astronomers study how gravity turns a molecular cloud into new stellar systems.
NASA published the material on September 16, 2026, using Webb observations made in 2024 and 2025. Original NASA publication: NASA’s Webb Reveals Dynamic Panorama of Star Formation. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-reveals-dynamic-panorama-of-star-formation/
IC 348 is a nearby laboratory for star formation. Cold molecular hydrogen collapses under gravity, while newly forming stars heat and reshape the surrounding cloud. The green and yellow structures in the image trace dusty material, and the central cluster contains young stars whose radiation illuminates the nebula. Infrared observations are especially useful because they reveal warm young objects and can look through some dust that blocks visible light.
The smallest ordinary stars have about eight percent of the Sun’s mass. Below that threshold, an object cannot sustain normal hydrogen fusion and is classified as a brown dwarf. The team first selected candidates using NIRCam colours and brightness, then used NIRSpec spectroscopy to estimate their masses. Several newly identified brown dwarfs contain only about two Jupiter masses, far below what many formation models expected.
One of the lightest objects also shows signs of a disk. This does not prove that planets are forming there, but it suggests that planet-forming environments might exist around an object whose own mass is comparable to a planet. The spectra also contain a feature attributed to an unidentified hydrocarbon, previously seen only in the atmospheres of the lowest-mass brown dwarfs.
Webb’s panorama includes protostars and Herbig–Haro objects. These glowing regions appear where narrow jets from growing stars crash into nearby gas and dust. The jets show that stellar birth is an active exchange of matter and energy, not simply a cloud collapsing in isolation. A young object can influence the environment around it while it is still gathering mass.
The observations belong to General Observer Program 4866. The program compares populations of planetary-mass objects in different star-forming regions and investigates the origin of the unusual hydrocarbon feature. Webb does not turn every patch of colour into a complete story, but its sensitivity and spectroscopy let scientists distinguish stars, brown dwarfs, dust, outflows and distant galaxies. That is what makes IC 348 important: it is a place to test where the boundary between a star and a planet begins, and how nature builds objects across that boundary.
The importance of the infrared view is not simply that it makes the picture brighter. Different wavelengths carry different information about dust, gas, temperature and young objects. NIRCam helped identify candidates, while NIRSpec dispersed their light into spectra. A spectrum, rather than a point’s colour alone, lets researchers test atmospheric composition and the physical properties of brown dwarfs.
The panorama also shows that a stellar nursery is not uniform. Dense dusty filaments, hot stars, protostars with outflows and objects that never become stars can exist in the same region. Studying them together allows astronomers to test whether the same physical rules apply to massive stars, small brown dwarfs and planet-mass bodies. This careful comparison between observations and models matters more than a single sensational number: it refines the picture of how one cloud of material can produce such a wide range of cosmic worlds.
NASA Builds Dragonfly: Flying Rotorcraft Will Explore Titan
NASA revealed a new stage in the construction of Dragonfly on September 2. The unusual rotorcraft is being built to fly across the surface of Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. At the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, engineers have installed the spacecraft’s electrical harness, connecting its computers, sensors, actuators, scientific instruments, and battery.
At the same time, Dragonfly’s future landing region received an official name: Ahmakiq Undae. The vast dune field lies near Selk Crater, where an ancient impact may once have brought liquid water and complex organic materials together.
Dragonfly is scheduled to launch in summer 2028 and arrive at Titan in late 2034. After landing, the spacecraft will not remain in one place: it will make multiple flights between different locations, allowing scientists to investigate one of the most intriguing worlds in the solar system.
On September 14, 2026, TeoKosmos highlights a new stage in the development of one of NASA’s most ambitious planetary missions. On September 2, the agency provided a fresh look at Dragonfly, a large robotic rotorcraft designed to fly across Titan.
Dragonfly is being assembled at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland. In July, the team installed the electrical harness on the flight fuselage. This network of cables, wires, and connectors serves as the spacecraft’s nervous system, carrying power and data between computers, actuators, sensors, instruments, and the battery.
The flight-ready harness contains approximately 17,315 feet of conductor wire, includes 374 connectors, and weighs about 100 pounds. Dragonfly will also carry a battery weighing nearly 300 pounds. Because Titan is extremely cold, the insulated spacecraft must retain heat from its nuclear power source.
The International Astronomical Union has officially approved the name Ahmakiq Undae for the large dune field where Dragonfly is expected to begin its exploration. It spans roughly 810 kilometres and lies near Selk Crater, an impact structure about 80 kilometres across. Deposits associated with Selk are among the mission’s major scientific targets.
Scientific analysis suggests that the impact may have melted Titan’s icy bedrock, producing a temporary pool of liquid water that could have remained for hundreds or even thousands of years. Liquid water and complex organic materials may have existed together there. Dragonfly will investigate Titan’s organic chemistry and environmental conditions relevant to habitability and the origins of life, not directly search for living organisms.
Dragonfly’s mobility is central to the mission. It will make multiple flights between different locations instead of remaining at one landing site. NASA plans to launch it in summer 2028, with arrival at Titan expected in late 2034. Its primary mission is planned to last about 3.3 years.
Titan’s dense atmosphere, rich organic chemistry, and complex geology make it a natural laboratory for studying chemical processes relevant to potentially habitable environments.
Original NASA publication: NASA’s Dragonfly Gets Wired Up While Titan Landing Area Is Named. Read the original on NASA: https://science.nasa.gov/blogs/dragonfly/2026/09/02/nasas-dragonfly-gets-wired-up-while-titan-landing-area-is-named/
M83 is a bright spiral galaxy whose arms, dark dust lanes and pink star-forming regions make it immediately recognisable. That structure gives it the name Southern Pinwheel. To astronomers, however, it is more than a beautiful target: it is a nearby laboratory for understanding how galaxies evolve. Its light contains evidence of older stellar generations, young massive stars and the remnants of violent events that happened millions of years ago. M83 lets researchers follow a complete material cycle, from a cold interstellar cloud to a star, a supernova and a new generation of enriched gas. A single galaxy can therefore preserve several chapters of cosmic history at once.
M83 lies about fifteen million light-years from Earth in the constellation Hydra. The light we receive today began its journey long before modern human civilisation. The galaxy is roughly forty thousand light-years across, smaller than the Milky Way but large enough to contain a complex disk and a clear spiral pattern. From Earth, M83 appears as a faint patch that requires a telescope, while space observations reveal its internal detail. Hubble can distinguish stars and clusters that merge together in a ground-based view. Different wavelengths add further information: visible light traces stars and dust, infrared observations reveal cooler material, ultraviolet light highlights hot young stars, and X-rays expose hot gas and compact remnants. Together these observations turn an attractive image into a physical portrait.
The spiral arms of M83 are not solid structures. They are regions of enhanced density moving through the galactic disk. As gas and dust pass through them, some clouds are compressed and gravity gathers material into the seeds of new stars. The hottest young stars emit ultraviolet radiation that ionises nearby hydrogen, making it glow red. Blue clusters generally indicate younger stellar populations, while warmer light more often comes from older stars. Dark dust lanes do more than block visible light: they hold the raw material from which later stars and planetary systems may form. The many bright red regions help explain M83’s second nickname, the Thousand-Ruby Galaxy. The name is poetic, but it points to a real process: gas, radiation and gravity are continuously reshaping the spiral disk.
Massive stars form in these active regions. They live shorter lives than the Sun because they consume nuclear fuel much faster, and their radiation and stellar winds reshape nearby clouds. At the end of their lives, some explode as supernovae. The shock wave can compress neighbouring gas, while the ejecta distribute heavy elements that may later become part of new stars, planets and complex molecules. The collapsed core can become a neutron star or, if enough mass remains, a black hole. M83 is valuable because it allows researchers to compare stellar nurseries with the sites where stars have died. It shows that a supernova is not only an ending. It is also a source of material and disturbance that can influence the next generation. The galaxy’s activity makes that cycle unusually accessible to observation.
The central region of M83 adds another layer to the story. Stars are more crowded there, gas follows complicated motions, and compact sources reveal energetic processes hidden from an ordinary optical image. X-ray observations show hot gas and systems in which neutron stars or black holes may draw material from companion stars. As that material falls inward, it becomes extremely hot and produces X-rays. Optical data show stars and dust, ultraviolet observations identify hot young populations, infrared light helps trace obscuring material, and X-rays reveal compact remnants and high-energy environments. No one wavelength is sufficient. Their combination allows astronomers to connect the visible structure of the galaxy with the physical engines operating inside it. This multi-wavelength approach is one of the main reasons M83 remains such a useful target.
M83 matters because it connects the scale of an entire galaxy with details that can be studied region by region. It helps test how gas becomes stars, how dust regulates that process, how supernovae enrich the interstellar medium and how energy moves between spiral arms and the centre. It is also a valuable comparison for the Milky Way. We live inside our own galaxy and cannot see its complete spiral form in a single external view. M83 offers a close example of a similar system that can be observed as a whole and then examined in detail. Its light reminds us that a galaxy is not a frozen collection of stars but a dynamic system in which matter and energy circulate. In the Southern Pinwheel, the past, present and future of stellar worlds meet in one cosmic portrait. Everything visible in the image belongs to one connected story. In this sense, M83 is an atlas of stellar ecology. It shows that a galactic disk is a connected system in which events in one region can change conditions elsewhere. Radiation from young stars heats gas, supernovae mix it, and gravity gathers part of the material into clouds again. Dust affects which light reaches us, so astronomers must consider not only brightness but also what is hidden behind dark lanes. Combining Hubble with other observatories helps separate these effects. Such studies reveal a sequence of transitions unfolding over millions of years. M83’s beauty comes from real physics: moving gas, light absorbed by dust, stars being born and elements redistributed after stellar deaths.
Parker Solar Probe checks in after another record-close pass of the Sun
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has successfully completed its 29th close approach to the Sun. At closest approach on September 4, 2026, the spacecraft came within about 3.8 million miles, or 6.1 million kilometres, of the solar surface and reached 430,000 miles per hour — roughly 692,000 kilometres per hour. It again matched the speed and distance records first set during its December 24, 2024 pass.
Parker operated autonomously for nine days around perihelion because its trajectory limited communications with Earth. On September 7, it transmitted a beacon tone confirming that its systems were operating normally. In a single day the spacecraft travelled through and sampled a span equivalent to almost 40% of the Sun’s circumference. The full encounter period ran from August 30 through September 9.
For this pass, Parker’s camera was trained on structures and activity near the Sun’s north pole. At the same time, all four science instrument suites collected measurements from inside the corona, the Sun’s outer atmosphere. Detailed spacecraft telemetry is scheduled to begin returning on September 11, followed by science-data transmission from September 13 through September 27. Researchers will assess the encounter fully only after those observations are received and calibrated.
The probe studies the solar wind, coronal mass ejections and the aftermath of solar flares. Together, these phenomena drive space weather that can affect satellites, communications, aviation, electrical grids and astronaut safety. Measurements made so close to the Sun capture particles and magnetic fields before they are substantially altered during their journey through the solar system. That gives scientists a powerful way to test models of the corona and improve future warnings of hazardous solar activity.
Parker launched in August 2018, when the Sun was near the quiet minimum of its roughly 11-year activity cycle. Across 29 encounters, the mission has watched the corona change from relatively calm conditions to the solar-maximum period announced in 2024. This long sequence is scientifically valuable because it records the evolving Sun over a substantial part of one activity cycle rather than offering only a snapshot of a single event.
The spacecraft will remain in its current orbit and continue observing as solar activity moves into its declining phase. NASA’s 2026 Heliophysics Senior Review extended the mission into 2029. Parker was developed under NASA’s Living With a Star programme; Goddard Space Flight Center manages the programme, while the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory designed, built and operates the spacecraft. The official journey graphic used here is credited to NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Steve Gribben.
Chandra unveils a mysterious class of X-ray objects
NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has helped astronomers identify a new class of cosmic objects that emit unusually low-energy, or “soft,” X-rays while also appearing to produce intense ultraviolet radiation. The researchers call them hypersoft X-ray sources. They behave unlike any known group of objects and may help address two long-standing questions in astrophysics.
Led by Mustafa Muhibullah of the University of Alabama, the team searched publicly available data in the Chandra archive. The sources appeared in images taken at the lowest X-ray energies but vanished from images at higher energies. Their output is therefore strongly weighted toward soft X-rays. Because low-energy X-rays border energetic ultraviolet radiation on the electromagnetic spectrum, the researchers concluded that these sources may also be producing large amounts of ultraviolet light.
The team found 84 of the objects in six galaxies. The sample includes the spiral galaxies M31, the Andromeda galaxy, and M101, the Pinwheel galaxy, as well as four elliptical galaxies. The sources occur both in regions of active star formation and among older stellar populations. In the M101 composite, seven of the sources are marked with circles. The image combines Chandra X-ray data, shown in purple, with optical observations from the Hubble Space Telescope in red, green and blue.
Scientists do not yet know exactly what produces the unusual emission. The leading possibility is a binary system in which a black hole, neutron star or white dwarf pulls material from a companion star. The captured material heats up and produces X-rays before falling onto the white dwarf or neutron star, or into the black hole. Astronomers have seen many such binaries, but never with this combination of unusually bright ultraviolet radiation and very low-energy X-rays.
The discovery may be important for understanding Type Ia supernovae. Some white dwarf systems that draw material from a companion may eventually explode. Type Ia supernovae are essential tools for measuring the expansion of the Universe and played a central role in the discovery that this expansion is accelerating. Finding systems before they explode could help researchers determine what actually ignites these powerful stellar explosions.
The sources may also help explain how electrons are stripped from gas between stars in some galaxies. Hot, massive stars contribute to this process, but they do not fully account for the observed energy. The strong ultraviolet output of hypersoft sources could provide part of the missing explanation. These objects escaped detection because their faint soft X-rays require long observations, while ultraviolet light is readily absorbed by hydrogen and helium between the stars. Further work with the Chandra archive and new observations will be needed to identify the systems behind this newly recognised population.
NASA’s new Astronomy Picture of the Day features XZ Andromedae — not one star, but an Algol-type eclipsing binary. Its orbit is viewed almost edge-on from Earth. When the cooler star passes in front of its hotter, brighter companion, the system’s combined light fades; when it moves aside, the brightness rises again. This repeating pattern in the light curve makes the star appear to “wink.”
A light curve records how an object’s brightness changes over time. NASA’s feature shows how comparing XZ Andromedae with other stars in the image helps isolate the system’s real variation from many changes caused by the instrument and Earth’s atmosphere. Analysis of several light curves also suggests that two additional stars may orbit the pair.
The method is useful far beyond eclipsing binaries. The same differential-photometry approach can help study transiting exoplanets, accretion around black holes, supernovae and many other astronomical phenomena that vary with time. These apparent winks become precise measurements of orbital geometry and stellar properties.
NASA accelerates technologies for a future Moon base
NASA announced a new NextSTEP-3 call for proposals to speed up technologies needed for a sustained human presence near the Moon’s south pole. The programme targets infrastructure that must operate through vacuum, lunar dust, extreme temperature swings and long periods of darkness. NASA is seeking solutions for vertical solar arrays with storage, extracting oxygen from lunar regolith, radioisotope Stirling generators, in-space manufacturing and innovative nanomaterials. Local oxygen and manufacturing could reduce dependence on resupply from Earth and make future lunar missions more flexible and resilient. The official announcement was published on September 8, 2026.
Hubble and Webb find tiny worlds that “remember” the solar system’s birth
NASA combined Hubble observations in visible light with Webb observations in infrared for the first time to study 27 newly discovered trans-Neptunian objects — small icy bodies beyond Neptune. The smallest is about 5 kilometres across, and some are among the faintest objects of their kind ever detected directly.
Researchers expected repeated collisions to have altered the surfaces of these small bodies, yet their colours match those of their larger relatives. That suggests they may preserve primordial compositions and a kind of “memory” of where and how they formed more than 4.5 billion years ago.
Webb also found fewer small trans-Neptunian objects than some planet-formation models predict. The result offers new clues to how dust and pebbles in the early protoplanetary disk assembled into planetesimals — the building blocks of planets.
New Hubble Space Telescope observations reveal a ten-sided cloud pattern around Saturn’s south pole. Its geometric boundaries may be caused by waves where fast-moving gas farther from the pole interacts with slower-moving gas closer to it, echoing the planet’s famous northern hexagon.
The Pelican Nebula: starlight carving a path through gas and dust
Today’s NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day features IC 5070, the Pelican Nebula in the constellation Cygnus. A dark molecular cloud filled with cold dust separates its silhouette from the neighbouring North America Nebula. That dust shapes the familiar bird-like outline while also hiding much of what is happening inside the cloud.
The Pelican is more than a striking patch of sky: it is an active stellar nursery. Young energetic stars bathe the surrounding gas in ultraviolet light, gradually changing cold material into hot gas. The boundary between those environments is an ionization front, a wave that advances through the cloud over time. In the image it appears as a bright orange region toward the upper right. Dense dust “tentacles” remain colder and resist the radiation for longer.
The featured image, made from 25 hours of exposure in Utah, reveals delicate dust filaments and layered gas that a short exposure would miss. Astronomers study IC 5070 to understand how the birth of massive stars reshapes its parent cloud and influences later generations of star formation. The nebula is changing on immense timescales: millions of years from now, its gas, dust and stars will have shifted enough that the Pelican we recognise today may no longer exist as the same cosmic shape.
The story matters because it shows stars not as isolated points of light, but as forces that remodel an entire ecosystem. Radiation from young stars heats, compresses and disperses gas, influencing where future generations of stars can form. By observing regions like this at different stages, researchers build a broader picture of how galaxies evolve and how the material for future planetary systems is prepared.
Swift support spacecraft continues technology demonstrations
NASA reported manoeuvres and capability checks for the robotic LINK spacecraft. The tests help develop rendezvous and in-orbit servicing techniques while Swift continues science observations with two instruments.
Sentinel-5P reveals early signs of changing European emissions
Researchers used nitrogen-dioxide measurements from Copernicus Sentinel-5P to trace signs of fossil-fuel use. It is an example of how space-based data can help study processes on Earth.
The joint ESA–JAXA mission has entered the demanding Mercury-arrival phase after an eight-year journey. Its two science orbiters are preparing for work at the innermost planet.
Hubble spots a ten-sided wave at Saturn’s south pole
New Hubble observations reveal a large ten-sided wave pattern in Saturn’s atmosphere. NASA calls it the first regular polygonal jet pattern of this scale seen in the planet’s southern hemisphere.