Space Photos of the Week: Dead Stars and a Cute L’il Comet

67p is known as the rubber ducky comet because of its funky shape—the result of two smaller bodies colliding.

Strap in and fire up your warp drives because this week we are traversing deep space and then some. First we’re going to hang around some dead stars, but really it’s cooler than you think. When stars die they tend to leave behind evidence of their existence. Often that evidence comes in the form of gorgeous tendrils of gas and clouds that can emit different wavelengths of light, making for some very pretty photos.

Next we’ll quickly swing by the comet 67p to check out its icy and rocky terrain. To this day the Rosetta mission stills holds the record for the first to land a spacecraft on a comet (RIP Philae) and return photos from it. 67p is also known as the rubber-ducky comet because of its odd shape. Formally, it is what’s called a contact-binary or a comet created when two smaller bodies collide and then attach to create a funny shaped space object like this one.

Finally, the Hubble Space Telescope will take us out of the galaxy altogether, and we will visit a massive galaxy cluster that is warping the very fabric of space time. Galaxy clusters are the largest known objects in the universe so getting to visit them is really quite special.

Want to keep floating around deep space? Visit the full cosmic collection here.


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