The universe is a scary, mysterious, beautiful place. We love these 12 photos that prove just how beautiful it can be.
1) Horsehead Nebula
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captured this beautiful infrared view of this nebula in the constellation Orion located about 1,500 light-years away from the Earth.
2) The M106 Galaxy
This spiral galaxy has long, whisky arms that are not that different from our own Milky Way galaxy. At the center of the galaxy there is a supermassive black hole that is consuming tons of material and emitting it as powerful radiation.
3) Black Hole Outburst in M83
This image, taken by the Chandra X-ray Observatory, shows the spiral galaxy M83 located about 15 million light years from Earth.
4) Carina Nebula
Located about 6,500 light-years from Earth, the Carina Nebula is one of the younger systems featured in this article. The combination of dust, gas, and newly-formed stars makes this view one of our favorites!
5) Serenity Nebula
Casperium created this artist rendition of the conceptual Serenity Nebula. This variant with post-processing shows the wispy clouds, dense dust, and the broad range of color.
And here's the original version:
6) The Ring Nebula
The M57 Nebula (better known as the Ring Nebula) lies about 2,400 light years away from Earth. It's incredibly bright, and even with a small telescope the incredible flower-shaped petals are easy to spot.
7) Whirlpool Galaxy
Taken by the Chandra X-Ray telescope, this image shows the strange shape of this spiral galaxy, with super-large stars on one of the spiral arms.
8) Majestic Sombrero Galaxy
Viewing this galaxy from the side is a completely different experience from most of the other views of surrounding galaxies. This galaxy is massive - over 50,000 light-years across!
9) Helix Nebula
The red center of this nebula is caused by a high concentration of dust. Captured by the Spitzer Space Telescope, the red and green colors of this nebula come from the infrared wavelengths that the image was captured in.
10) Wizard Nebula
Normally, this nebula is much too faint to be seen by the naked eye. But large telescopes on Earth can see this nebula in all it's glory. This image was post-processed to brighten the background stars.
11) Atlas V Launch
An Atlas V launch takes about 10 minutes to reach orbit. This long-exposure photograph shows the full rocket plume trail from liftoff-to-Space, even through the low-level clouds at Cape Canaveral.
12) Star Cluster Pismus 24
Located in the NGC 6357 Nebula about 8100 light-years away from Earth, this small cluster of stars sits above a thick layer of gas and dust.
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