1. Mercury's very own satellite.
NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft, which recently celebrated its 10-year launch anniversary in August, has been in a steady orbit around Mercury since 2011 and has gathered 255,858 images since its launch. It was a risk sending the small satellite on the mission, but after a decade in space, the images captured have been invaluable to understanding our solar system's smallest planet.
2. Earth-sized solar flare.
3. Finding Venus.
in the 1960s, Venus was thought to be Earth's exact twin with the potential for hiding advanced civilization beneath its dense clouds. The two images above show the planet silhouetted by the sun taken from Riverside Park in Manhattan and NASA's SDO satellite, respectively.
4. The Martian rovers.
Moving farther from Earth, we have robotic photographers on the surface of Mars! In addition to the Curiosity Mars rover NASA has two other rovers on the planet as part of its Mars Exploration Rover Mission: the Spirit and Opportunity. The crater above, named Echus Chasma, was first captured by the ESA's Mars Express, and the image of the planet's horizon was taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.
5. Jupiter's natural satellites.
6. Saturn silhouetted.
7. The dark side of Uranus.
8. The farthest planet from the sun.
9. Cosmic bodies seen from home.
These images of the NGC 1999 nebula, the Cat's Eye Nebula, and the NGC 1275 galaxy (respectively) were taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope (pictured above), which orbits Earth.
Get pumped to take on the lush jungles of Venus, the cold depths of the Moon, and the sandy dunes of Mars in Destiny!
Explore farther and be legendary on today.
