Bottle Rocket Under Ice

Fata Morgna

A Superior Mirage that comes from the Italian term named after the Arthurian sorceress Morgan le Fay, from a belief that these mirages, often seen in the Strait of Messina, were fairy castles in the air or false land created by her witchcraft to lure sailors to their deaths. It’s also believed that this illusion caused the myth of The Flying Dutchman to emerge.

Excerpt from Juno Mission Trailer Video Credit: NASA, JPL, Juno Mission 

Watch the full 2 minute trailer on APOD here.

It’s sad how much of what is taught in school is useless to over 99% of the population.

There are literally math concepts taught in high school and middle school that are only used in extremely specialized fields or that are even so outdated they aren’t used anymore!

some of my favourite microscope images I’ve taken

please don’t repost without credit

Do you ever think about Doggerland?

Like how fucked up is it that it’s just….. gone.

I tend to forget about it and then when I remember it again I’m like “Oh yeah! There’s like an entire country sized stretch of land that’s just fucking GONE.

well…. “gone”….

Galaxy and Planets Beyond Bristlecone Pines

(via APOD; Image Credit & Copyright: Brad Goldpaint (Goldpaint Photography) )

What’s older than these ancient trees? Nobody you know – but almost everything in the background of this picture. The trees are impressively old – each part of the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest located in eastern California, USA. There, many of the oldest trees known are located, some dating as far back as about 5,000 years. Seemingly attached to tree branches, but actually much farther in the distance, are the bright orbs of Saturn (left) and Mars. These planets formed along with the Earth and the early Solar System much earlier – about 4.5 billion years ago. Swooping down diagonally from the upper left is the oldest structure pictured: the central band of our Milky Way Galaxy – dating back around 9 billion years. The featured image was built from several exposures all taken from the same location – but only a few weeks ago.

Sunset lights the bottom of the clouds, viewed from above.

nprovince101

An example of crown flashes, also called jumping sun dogs. They’re streamers of light above storm clouds that appear to dance and flash, sometimes quite rapidly, looking like search lights or huge light sabers.

They’re almost certainly caused by long ice crystals above the cloud that align themselves with the cloud’s electric field. If you see them from the right angle, they bend (or refract) the sunlight toward you, causing the glow. 

When lightning erupts from the cloud to the ground (or inside the cloud) the electric field changes radically, realigning the ice crystals. When this happens they suddenly bend sunlight in a different direction, causing the glow to shift. (Source)

Juno in Jupiter (the images that appear the juno probe is just an illustration) +Jupiter

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin M. Gill