r/MilkyWayPlayground

Link to a high-res image on ESA website

A spiral galaxy shown in mid-infrared light. The image is dominated by an extremely bright glow from the galaxy’s nucleus. Six large and two smaller rays of light emit from the centre, which are diffraction spikes created by the telescope’s optics.

The galaxy’s spiral arms are visible by two lines of glowing orange bubbles which whirl out into the disc. Swirling blue clouds of dust make up the rest of the galaxy.

Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Leroy

Scientists have developed a new model for simulating waves on other planets. Titan is one of the 274 confirmed moons of Saturn to date, and the only object in the solar system (besides Earth) known to have liquid lakes and seas on its surface.

The featured video shows a simulation of waves on Titan (top) and on Earth (bottom), under the same conditions (the scale marker is in meters). A light breeze would create taller, slower-moving waves on Titan than on Earth, because the lakes there are filled with light liquid hydrocarbons, and because of Titan's low gravity and higher atmospheric pressure.

In a couple of years, NASA expects to launch the Dragonfly mission, which will travel for 6 years and send a rotorcraft to explore Titan and study its microbial habitability.

Video Credit: Una Schneck
Text Credit: Cecilia Chirenti

Voyager 1's image of Saturn's moon Mimas, captured on November 12, 1980

The various planets are thought to have formed from the solar nebula, the disc-shaped cloud of gas and dust left over from the Sun's formation. The currently accepted method by which the planets formed is accretion, in which the planets began as dust grains in orbit around the central protostar.

Through direct contact and self-organization, these grains formed into clumps up to 200 m (660 ft) in diameter, which in turn collided to form larger bodies (planetesimals) of ~10 km (6.2 mi) in size.

These gradually increased through further collisions, growing at the rate of centimetres per year over the course of the next few million years.

Credit: Milky Way app