Exploration of Celestial Bodies

This cluster features detailed images of moons and asteroids showcasing craters, terrain features, and shadows, set against a dark backdrop.

The Crown of Tethys

The Crown of Tethys

Great White Splat

The shadowy outlines of the terrain in Vesta's northern region are visible in this image from NASA's Dawn spacecraft. The image comes from the last sequence of images Dawn obtained of the giant asteroid Vesta as it departed the giant asteroid.

Occator Crater and Ahuna Mons appear together in this view obtained by NASA's Dawn spacecraft on Feb. 11, 2017. Ahuna Mons, on the limb at right, is a mountain 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) tall. Occator hosts the mysterious 'bright spots' called faculae.

The Cassini spacecraft stares directly into the great Odysseus impact basin on Tethys. Peaks near the crater's center cast long shadows toward the east. The elevated eastern rim of the crater catches sunlight

A World of Hurt

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft on May 7, 2015, from a distance of 8,400 miles (13,600 kilometers).

Penelope on Tethys

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft on May 7, 2015, from a distance of 8,400 miles (13,600 kilometers).

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft April 24 to 26, 2015, from a distance of 8,500 miles (13,500 kilometers).

$The famed wispy terrain on Saturn's moon Dione is front and center in this recent image captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The 'wisps' are fresh fractures on the trailing hemisphere of the moon's icy surface.$

Dione: North Polar View

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft April 24 to 26, 2015, from a distance of 8,500 miles (13,500 kilometers).

NASA's Dawn spacecraft obtained this image of terrestrial mountains on asteroid Vesta with its framing camera on Aug. 26, 2011. The image has a resolution of about 260 meters per pixel.

Highest Resolution View of Dione

NASA's Dawn spacecraft obtained this image of the giant asteroid Vesta with its framing camera on July 9, 2011. Vesta is also considered a protoplanet because it is a large body that almost became a planet.

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft April 24 to 26, 2015, from a distance of 8,500 miles (13,500 kilometers).

Dione's Icy Wisps

Saturn's Moon Dione Seen by Cassini

A Fresh Face

Dione in Full View

A world whose mysteries are just coming to light, Enceladus has enchanted scientists and non-scientists alike. With its potential for near-surface liquid water, the icy moon may be the latest addition to the list of possible abodes for life

Diversity of Impacts

Eros' Battered Surface

Sunlight illuminates the deep cut of Ithaca Chasma on Saturn's moon Tethys. Ithaca Chasma runs roughly north-south for more than 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) on Tethys in this image captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

Youthful Enceladus

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft April 24 to 26, 2015, from a distance of 8,500 miles (13,500 kilometers).

Cassini captured this striking view of Saturn's moon Dione on July 23, 2012. Dione is about 698 miles (1,123 kilometers) across. Its density suggests that about a third of the moon is made up of a dense core (probably silicate rock) with the remainder of its material being water ice. At Dione's average temperature of -304 degrees Fahrenheit (-186 degrees Celsius), ice is so hard it behaves like rock. The image was taken with Cassini's narrow-angle camera at a distance of approximately 260,000 miles (418,000 kilometers) from Dione, through a polarized filter and a spectral filter sensitive to green light. The Cassini spacecraft ended its mission on Sept. 15, 2017.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft captures a view of the southern latitudes of Saturn's tumbling moon Hyperion. Lit terrain seen here is mostly in the southern hemisphere of Hyperion. The south pole of the moon is near the bottom of the illuminated terrain.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft looks to the cratered surface of Saturn's second largest moon, Rhea.

This full view of the giant asteroid Vesta was taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, as part of a rotation characterization sequence on July 24, 2011, at a distance of 3,200 miles and shows impact craters of various sizes and grooves parallel to the equator.

Lunar crescent

This image from NASA's Dawn mission shows huge grooves on the giant asteroid Vesta that were the result of mega impacts at the south pole.

Saturn's rings appear curved in this view from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, which also shows the moon Janus in the distance. Janus is at the bottom of the image and is farther from the spacecraft than the rings are.

Two Very Different Asteroids

This image, taken by the framing camera instrument aboard NASA's Dawn spacecraft, shows the south polar region of this object, which has a diameter of 330 miles (530 kilometers). The image was taken through the clear filter on July 9, 2011, as part of a rotation characterization sequence, and it has a scale of about 2.2 miles (3.5 kilometers) per pixel. To enhance details, the resolution was enlarged to .6 miles (1 kilometer) per pixel. This region is characterized by rough topography, a large mountain, impact craters, grooves and steep scarps. The original image was map-projected, centered at 55 degrees southern latitude and 210 degrees eastern longitude.

NASA image release March 11, 2011 Caption The lunar farside as never seen before! LROC WAC orthographic projection centered at 180° longitude, 0° latitude.

Mosaic of Triton constructed from 16 individual images. After globally minimizing the camera pointing errors, the frames we reprocessed by map projections, photometric function removal and placement in the mosaic.

Wispy terrain stretches across the trailing hemisphere of Saturn's moon Dione on the right of this image taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft during the spacecraft's flyby on April 7, 2010.

Rhea in Saturnshine

This frame from an animated sequence of images shows northern terrain on the sunlit side of dwarf planet Ceres as seen by NASA's Dawn spacecraft on April 14 and 15, 2015.

Saturn's moon Mimas peeps out from behind the larger moon Dione in this view from NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

Looking Toward the Limb

This image of Ceres is part of a sequence taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft April 24 to 26, 2015, from a distance of 8,500 miles (13,500 kilometers).

This mosaic was assembled using NAC images acquired as the MESSENGER spacecraft approached the planet during the mission's second Mercury flyby The Rembrandt impact basin is seen at the center of the mosaic.

Craters of all sizes litter the landscape on Dione. The larger craters in this view display prominent central peak

The Cassini spacecraft surveys the battered surface of icy Tethys. The great impact basin straddling the terminator is itself overprinted by many smaller impact sites

The sponge-like surface of Saturn's moon Hyperion is highlighted in this portrait from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, captured during the spacecraft's flyby on Sept. 16, 2011.

Saturn's impact-pummeled moon Hyperion stares back at NASA's Cassini spacecraft in this six-image mosaic, taken during the spacecraft's close approach on Sept. 26, 2005.

This image shows the location of the newly discovered planet-like object, dubbed Sedna, in relation to the rest of the solar system in 2004.

NASA's Dawn spacecraft obtained this image of craters with bright features on asteroid Vesta with its framing camera on August 18, 2011. The image has a resolution of about 260 meters per pixel.

Inside Eros' Giant Gouge

Moon's North Pole

$Bright fractures creep across the surface of icy Dione. This extensive canyon system is centered on a region of terrain that is significantly darker that the rest of the moon. Part of the darker terrain is visible at right$

Miranda reveals a complex geologic history in this view, acquired by NASA's Voyager 2 on Jan. 24, 1986, around its close approach to the Uranian moon. At least three terrain types of different age and geologic style are evident.

Craters and Horizon of Mercury

Iapetus Seen by Cassini

Helene Attends Dione

Southern terrain on Saturn's moon Rhea is dimly illuminated by Saturnshine in this Cassini spacecraft view of the dark side of the moon.

This enhanced-color view of Saturn's moon Mimas was made from images obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft. It highlights the bluish band around the icy moon's equator. The large round gouge on the surface is Herschel Crater.

The surface of Ceres is covered with craters of many shapes and sizes, as seen in this frame from an animation of a map of the dwarf planet's surface as seen by NASA's Dawn spacecraft on Feb. 19, 2015.

$NASA's Cassini spacecraft looks across the surface of Saturn's moon Dione and details the 'wispy' terrain first chronicled by Voyager. This fractured terrain covers the trailing hemisphere of Dione.$

Possible Subsurface Ice on Phoebe

Crescent View of Mercury

NASA's Cassini spacecraft takes a close look at a row of craters on Saturn's moon Tethys during the spacecraft's April 14, 2012, flyby of the moon. Three large craters are visible along the terminator between day and night on Tethys.

MESSENGER Looks out on a Limb

Phoebe's Surprise

$Numerous blue-green fractures can be seen in this false-color mosaic taken during Cassini's second close flyby of Enceladus, on March 9, 2005$

1997 Martian Dust Storm

Miranda

Far Side of the Moon

Rhea's trailing hemisphere shows off its wispy terrain on the left of this image taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft which includes Saturn's rings in the distance.

Old and New Again

Two sources of light reveal the dramatic surface of Saturn's moon Enceladus in this NASA Cassini image in which geologic features give the appearance of the leathery skin of an elephant.

Odysseus the Great

Glimpses into Eros' Shadows

These three images of Neptune were acquired 90 minutes apart by NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft on April 3, 1989, from a range of 208 million kilometers (129 million miles). Several atmospheric features (clouds) are visible.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft spies the large Penelope crater on Saturn's moon Tethys.

Eros' Angular Eastern End

This montage shows asteroid 951 Gaspra (top) compared with Deimos (lower left) and Phobos (lower right), the moons of Mars.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft spied details on the pockmarked surface of Saturn's moon Prometheus (86 kilometers, or 53 miles across) during a moderately close flyby on Dec. 6, 2015. This is one of Cassini's highest resolution views of Prometheus.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft's February 2010 encounter with Calypso yielded this incredibly detailed view of this Trojan moon. Irregularly shaped Calypso is one of two Trojan moons of the larger moon Tethys.

Io - Volcanic Eruption

This montage shows the best views of Jupiter's four large and diverse 'Galilean' satellites as seen by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI)

AS08-12-2209 (21-27 Dec. 1968) --- High altitude oblique view of the lunar surface, looking northeastward, as seen from the Apollo 8 spacecraft. The crater Joliot-Curie, about 175 kilometers in diameter and centered near 94 degrees east longitude and 27 degrees north latitude, is near the center of the left side of this photograph. The bright rayed crater near the horizon is probably located near 105 degrees east longitude and 45 degrees north latitude. Long, narrow rays that have been reported in the polar region of Earth facing hemisphere may radiate from this crater.

These two global images of Iapetus taken by NASA's Cassini's spacecraft show the extreme brightness dichotomy on the surface of this peculiar Saturnian moon.

Color on Rhea

Apollo 13 - Innumerable Craters Scar the Surface of the Moon

South Polar Close Up

This still from a movie shows an image taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft layered on a digital terrain model of an unusual hill containing a dark-rayed impact crater and nearby dark deposit on asteroid Vesta.

Smooth and Rough Enceladus

Countdown to Phoebe

MESSENGER Sees the Previously Unseen!

Earthrise by Lunar Orbiter

AS12-47-6876 (November 1969) --- An Apollo 12 high-oblique view of the lunar nearside looking northeast toward the crater Copernicus (in center near horizon), as photographed from lunar orbit. The shaded crater in the foreground is Reinhold. Reinhold B is the crater next to Reinhold which as the small crater in the center of it. Also, visible is the keyhole-shaped crater Fauth near the crater Copernicus.

Ganymede - high resolution

The battered features of the moon Rhea, seen at low phase, appear washed out by the sun.

Natural Color Image of Icy Tethys Seen by Cassini

This image, taken 147,000 miles (237,000 kilometers) from Ceres on January 25, 2015 by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, is part of a series of views representing the best look so far at the dwarf planet.

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