the solar wind. Pictured from Rhode Island, USA two days ago, Comet R3 (PanSTARRS) shows off a many-degree ion tail. Comet R3 (PanSTARRS) is best seen before dawn from northern skies for another 10 days, after which it will be best visible from southern skies.
Growing Gallery: Comet R3 in 2026
is warmed by the Sun and emits a cloud of neutral gas into a coma that glows light green. Nuclear gas ionized by energetic sunlight is pushed away from the Sun by the solar wind into an ion tail that glows light blue. The wispy nature of the ion tail is caused by the constantly changing structure of
Why does Comet R3 (PanSTARRS) have a wispy tail? The newest bright member of the inner Solar System, Comet C/2025 R3 (PanSTARRS) is already extending an impressive stream of glowing gas. This tail starts from an unseen central nucleus of dirty ice that is likely a few kilometers across. The nucleus
A star field surrounds a bright comet with a long tail. The green coma of the comet is seen on the lower left, while the light blue ion tail extends to the upper right and shows wavey structure. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.
🔭 The Long Wispy Tail of Comet R3 (PanSTARRS)
Image Credit & Copyright: Haythem Hamdi
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See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.
🔭 Artemis II: Flight Day 6
Image Credit: NASA, Artemis II
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See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.
🔭 Exploring the Antennae
Image Credit & Copyright: Acquisition - Mike Selby Processing - Roberto Colombari
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Surprise: What picture did APOD feature on your birthday? (after 1995)
estimated distance of the Small Magellanic Cloud, the featured picture spans about 200 light-years, but a tantalizing assortment of background galaxies are also visible in this sharp multi-colored view. The background galaxies are hundreds of millions of light-years or more beyond NGC 602.
Sky
stunning Hubble image of the region. Fantastic ridges and swept back shapes strongly suggest that energetic radiation and shock waves from NGC 602's massive young stars have eroded the dusty material and triggered a progression of star formation moving away from the cluster's center. At the
The clouds may look like an oyster, and the stars like pearls, but look beyond. Near the outskirts of the Small Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy some 200 thousand light-years distant, lies 5 million year young star cluster NGC 602. Surrounded by natal gas and dust, NGC 602 is featured in this
A starfield surrounds a large light-brown nebula that has several dust pillars. In the center of the nebula are many bright blue stars. Some distant galaxies are visible through and around the nebula. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.
🔭 NGC 602 and Beyond
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) - ESA/Hubble Collaboration
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🔭 Destruction of Comet C/2026 A1 (MAPS)
Video Credit: Brian Day, SOHO, SDO, JHelioviewer
Text: Cecilia Chirenti (NASA GSFC, UMCP, CRESST II)
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Or it may live to leave the Solar System.
Growing Gallery: Comet R3 in 2026
comet is hard to predict, the brightness of R3 makes it already a good camera comet and it may become visible to the unaided eye in the next week. Comet R3's physical future is also unknown because, like Comet A1 (MAPS) earlier this month, it may disintegrate when it passes its closest to the Sun.
and the Earth (April 25). The featured image, showing R3 already sporting a tail extending over 10 degrees, was taken two nights ago from Sion, Switzerland with the big mountain Bietschhorn on the left. Comet R3 will be visible during mid-April before sunrise. Although the future brightness of any
Comet R3 is brightening rapidly -- will it survive? C/2025 R3 (PanSTARRS) has been slowly brightening and extending an ion tail since its discovery last year. This shedding mountain of dirty ice puts on its best sky show this month, though, because it passes its closest to both the Sun (April 19)
A starry night is seen above foreground mountains. Toward the right is a comet with its head near the bottom center and a long tail extending toward the upper right. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.
🔭 Comet R3 (PanSTARRS) Brightens
Image Credit & Copyright: José Rodrigues
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NASA alt text: Earthset captured through the Orion spacecraft window at 6:41 p.m. EDT, April 6, 2026, during the Artemis II crew’s flyby of the Moon. A muted blue Earth with bright white clouds sets behind the cratered lunar surface. The dark portion of Earth is experiencing nighttime. On Earth’s day side, swirling clouds are visible over the Australia and Oceania region. In the foreground, Ohm crater has terraced edges and a flat floor interrupted by central peaks. Central peaks form in complex craters when the lunar surface, liquefied on impact, splashes upwards during the crater’s formation.
🔭 Earthset
Image Credit: NASA
Text: Keighley Rockcliffe (NASA GSFC, UMBC CSST, CRESST II)
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spacecraft and lunar far side. Planet Earth, home to the Artemis II crew, is the small, bright crescent beyond the lunar limb. The crew safely returned home on Artemis II mission flight day 10.
Artemis II: Splashdown
Artemis II crew, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen, set the record for the farthest distance from Earth traveled by any human since the Apollo 13 crew in 1970. From behind the Moon on flight day 6, a solar array wing camera recorded this space age selfie, framing the
On flight day 6 (April 6) the Artemis II mission achieved a historic lunar flyby. Rounding the lunar far side, the deep space maneuver marked humanity's first venture to the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. The Orion spacecraft Integrity reached a maximum distance of nearly 407,000 kilometers, and the
See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.
🔭 Artemis II: Flight Day 6
Image Credit: NASA, Artemis II
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A starfield surrounds a large nebula that is mostly brown and blue and has an appearance reminiscent of the head of a horse. This nebula is not the more famous Horsehead Nebula. Please see the explanation for more detailed information.
🔭 IC 4592: The Blue Horsehead Reflection Nebula
Image Credit & Copyright: Rabeea Alkuwari
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The Antennae.
Artemis II: mission updates
gravitational tidal forces. The remarkably sharp ground-based image follows the faint tidal tails and distant background galaxies in the field of view. The suggestive overall visual appearance of the extended arcing structures gives the galaxy pair, also known as Arp 244, its popular name -
clouds of molecular gas and dust often do, triggering furious episodes of star formation near the center of the cosmic wreckage. Spanning over 50 thousand light-years, this stunning telescopic frame also reveals new star clusters and matter flung far from the scene of the accident by
Some 60 million light-years away in the southerly constellation Corvus, two large galaxies are colliding. Stars in the two galaxies, cataloged as NGC 4038 and NGC 4039, very rarely collide in the course of the ponderous cataclysm that lasts for hundreds of millions of years. But the galaxies' large
See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest resolution version available.
🔭 Exploring the Antennae
Image Credit & Copyright: Acquisition - Mike Selby Processing - Roberto Colombari
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🔭 The Path of Artemis II
Video Credit: NASA, GSFC, Artemis II, SVS
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reappearing as a cloud of debris that dissipates.