Astronauts captured this unusual view of a Perseid meteor descending into Earth's atmosphere in August 2011.
Published Aug 17, 2011
At the boundary between Earth and space, particles and gases and energy do an intricate and colorful dance that varies daily.
Published Jan 7, 2020
Photographers captured these digital photos of a four-stage Black Brant XII sounding rocket and the aurora borealis on December 12, 2010, during the NASA-funded Rocket Experiment for Neutral Upwelling (RENU).
Published Jan 4, 2011
City lights sprawl across Earth’s surface below a constant glow in the upper atmosphere.
Published Oct 23, 2018
Solar storms smacked into Earth’s magnetic field and provoked auroras over the southern and northern hemisphere just after the summer solstice.
Published Jun 28, 2015
Researchers probed the auroral wind by shooting instruments into them in February 2013.
Published Feb 9, 2013
A geomagnetic storm in early October lit up the skies with northern lights that were detected by an Earth-observing satellite.
Published Oct 10, 2012
A pair of sounding rockets took aim at the aurora over Svalbard, Norway, to help scientists understand how Earth loses oxygen into space.
Published Dec 17, 2018
The diffuse orange and green bands of light are caused by molecules in the atmosphere that have been energized by absorbing ultraviolet radiation from the Sun.
Published Oct 8, 2020
From a vantage point about 360 km (225 miles) over the Earth, Space Station crewmembers photographed the crescent moon through the upper layers of Earth’s atmosphere. At the bottom of the image, a closed deck of clouds is probably at about 6 km (3 miles). The shades of blue grading to black are caused by the scatter of light as it strikes gas molecules of the very low density upper atmosphere.
Published Feb 23, 2004
The Suomi NPP satellite captured a glimpse of the northern lights over North America.
Published Apr 24, 2018
Satellites are shedding new light on the invisible processes and rhythms at play at the intersection between Earth and space.
Published Dec 26, 2019
The limb of the Earth is a work of awesome beauty and a gift to science.
Published Nov 26, 2011
In the northern hemisphere, night-shining clouds seem to be forming earlier and spreading farther each year, as they did in 2013.
Published Jun 25, 2013
From space, the aurora is a crown of light that circles each of Earth’s poles. The IMAGE satellite captured this view of the aurora australis four days after a record-setting solar flare sent plasma flying towards the Earth.
Published Jan 25, 2006
A strong solar wind stream stirred up a display of northern lights over northern Canada.
Published Dec 25, 2016
On Saint Patrick’s Day, the Suomi NPP satellite acquired a view of the aurora from above while citizen scientists were busily collecting shots from below.
Published Mar 29, 2015
