Astronomy Picture of the Day

NASA 오늘의 사진 (2022-05-03)

경진 2022. 5. 3. 23:06

안녕하세요. 오늘은 NASA에서 어떤 우주의 모습을 비춰줄까요?
먼저 사진부터 감상하시죠!

 

이 사진의 제목은 Mercury's Sodium Tail 입니다. NASA에서 공식적으로 제공한 설명을 보시죠.

 

That's no comet. Below the Pleiades star cluster is actually a planet: Mercury. Long exposures of our Solar System's innermost planet may reveal something unexpected: a tail. Mercury's thin atmosphere contains small amounts of sodium that glow when excited by light from the Sun. Sunlight also liberates these molecules from Mercury's surface and pushes them away. The yellow glow from sodium, in particular, is relatively bright. Pictured, Mercury and its sodium tail are visible in a deep image taken last week from La Palma, Spain through a filter that primarily transmits yellow light emitted by sodium. First predicted in the 1980s, Mercury's tail was first discovered in 2001. Many tail details were revealed in multiple observations by NASA's robotic MESSENGER spacecraft that orbited Mercury between 2011 and 2015. Tails, of course, are usually associated with comets.

 

오늘도 광활한 우주 앞에 인간이 얼마나 작은 존재인지 깨닫게 되네요.
저는 내일도 더 좋은 사진과 함께 돌아오겠습니다, 행복한 지구여행 되세요!