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Uranus, 2005.

Credit: NASA, ESA and M Showalter (SETI Institute)

Gigantic Ring System Around J1407b Much Larger, Heavier Than Saturn’s.

(via)

The Pleiades and Jupiter over the Subaru telescope, an 8.2-meter optical-infrared telescope situated at the summit of Mauna Kea, Hawaii and operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.

Subaru is the name of the Pleiades open star cluster in Japanese!

Animations of Saturn’s aurorae

Earth isn’t the only planet in the solar system with spectacular light shows. Both Jupiter and Saturn have magnetic fields much stronger than Earth’s. Auroras also have been observed on the surfaces of Venus, Mars and even on moons (e.g. Io, Europa, and Ganymede). The auroras on Saturn are created when solar wind particles are channeled into the planet’s magnetic field toward its poles, where they interact with electrically charged gas (plasma) in the upper atmosphere and emit light. Aurora features on Saturn can also be caused by electromagnetic waves generated when its moons move through the plasma that fills the planet’s magnetosphere.  The main source is the small moon Enceladus, which ejects water vapor from the geysers on its south pole, a portion of which is ionized. The interaction between Saturn’s magnetosphere and the solar wind generates bright oval aurorae around the planet’s poles observed in visible, infrared and ultraviolet light. The aurorae of Saturn are highly variable. Their location and brightness strongly depends on the solar wind pressure: the aurorae become brighter and move closer to the poles when the solar wind pressure increases.

Credit: ESA/Hubble (M. Kornmesser & L. Calçada)

Jupiter/Moon Conjunction.

Credit: Pete Lardizabal