The year's most wondrous space photography
From glittering Martian sand dunes to stunning star trails, 2016 was a good-looking year for the universe
Defrosting sand dunes in the Southern Hemisphere of Mars.
(NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)
A composite image of NGC 6357, a region of the galaxy that contains at least three clusters of young stars.
(X-ray: NASA/CXC/PSU/L. Townsley et al; Optical: UKIRT; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech)
Saturn's main rings and its moons.
(NASA/Cassini Imaging team)
The Nili Fossae region of Mars.
(NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona)
A new batch of stars are born within the constellation Vulpecula (Latin for "little fox").
(ESA/Herschel/PACS, SPIRE/Hi-GAL Project)
The sunlit part of Jupiter and its swirling atmosphere.
(NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Mai)
The spiral galaxy NGC 6814.
(ESA/Hubble & NASA; Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt)
The fluted surface and elongated hills of the Medusae Fossae on Mars.
(NASA/JPL/University of Arizona)
The Milky Way's nuclear star cluster, the most massive and densest star cluster in our galaxy.
(NASA, ESA, and Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA, Acknowledgment: T. Do, A.Ghez (UCLA), V. Bajaj (STScI))
An aerial view of the Sahara desert in western Libya.
(Sally Ride EarthKAM)
Star trails captured by astronauts on the International Space Station.
(NASA)
A maelstrom of glowing gas and dark dust within one of the Milky Way's satellite galaxies, the Large Magellanic Cloud.
(ESA/Hubble & NASA)
