The Vera Rubin Observatory has released its first images, stunning the scientific community, particularly with the discovery of over 2,100 new asteroids. Plus, sublimation on Mars reveals dark, tree-like streaks, and we take a look back at Comet 67P, the target of ESA's Rosetta mission. Speaking of reveals, droughts can cause receding shorelines that expose hidden wonders, such as an ancient stone circle in Spain. Lastly, we celebrate the Fourth of July with the stellar fireworks of supernova 1987a.
Credit: NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory
Monday, 30 June 2025
Today is Asteroid Day, the anniversary of the Tunguska Event, when we raise awareness about potentially hazardous asteroids and their possible impacts on Earth. We also celebrate the addition of a new tool in our quest for planetary defense—the Vera Rubin Observatory. During the observatory's First Look last week, a new video revealed the discovery of over 2,100 new asteroids, including seven near-Earth objects (NEOs). This screenshot from the video shows a small portion of those discoveries, taken while looking at a small swath of the sky during this first image release.
Watch the full video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTuq-vBsDJE
Credit: NASA, HiRISE, MRO, LPL (U. Arizona)
Tuesday, 1 July 2025
Naturally erupting dust streaks on Mars create structures that look surprisingly like trees near the planet's north pole. These streaks are dark basaltic sand pushed to the surface of sand dunes by sun-heated solid carbon dioxide ice, or dry ice, sublimating directly into vapor. The sand dunes form a nearly complete ring around Mars' north pole and are covered by a thin layer of reddish Martian dust and patches of dry ice.
Credit: ESA, Rosetta spacecraft, NAVCAM; Additional Processing: Stuart Atkinson
Wednesday, 2 July 2025
Captured by the Rosetta spacecraft, this incredible image shows a one-kilometer-high cliff on Comet Churyumov–Gerasimenko, better known as 67P. The ragged cliff, as featured here, was imaged by Rosetta early in its mission. Because of the comet's low gravity, you could probably jump from the top of the cliff and fully enjoy the descent and the landing without too much trouble. A relatively smooth icy terrain is dotted with boulders as large as 20 meters across. Data from Rosetta indicates that the ice in 67P has a significantly different deuterium fraction -- and hence likely a different origin -- than the water in Earth's oceans.
Credit: NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin / USGS; Pleonr via Wikimedia Commons
Thursday, 3 July 2025
The first two images here were taken by NASA/USGS Landsat satellites on July 24, 2013, and July 25, 2019. They show the Valdecañas Reservoir in western Spain before and during a European-wide drought that caused the shoreline to recede. The circle notes an area revealed during that drought, which contains a set of more than 100 standing granite stones dating back 7,000 years, seen up close in the final picture and known as the "Dolmen of Guadalperal".
Credit: NASA, ESA, and A. Angelich (NRAO/AUI/NSF); Hubble: NASA, ESA, and R. Kirshner (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation); Chandra: NASA/CXC/Penn State/K. Frank et al.; ALMA: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO) and R. Indebetouw (NRAO/AUI/NSF)
Friday, 4 July 2025
Astronomers combined observations from three different observatories to produce this colorful, multiwavelength image of the intricate remains of Supernova 1987A. The central structure visible inside the ring in the Hubble image has now grown to roughly half a light-year across. Most noticeable are two blobs of debris in the center of the supernova remnant racing away from each other at approximately 20 million miles per hour.
Astronomers also observed a flash of neutrinos from the star just as it erupted. This detection gives astronomers considerable confidence that a compact object formed at the center of the star's collapse — either a neutron star or a black hole — but no telescope has yet uncovered any evidence for one.
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