[ INSTAGRAM ] : @NASAGoddard, le compte de la NASA

Aujourd’hui, on vous (re)présente un compte Instagram à couper le souffle : celui de la NASA ! Plus précisément, le compte du Goddard Space Flight Center, l’un des principaux centres de recherche de l’agence, dédié aux sciences de la Terre et de l’Univers. Images du Soleil, de la Terre, de nébuleuses et de galaxies, phénomènes atmosphériques et « coulisses » de missions : @nasagoddard en met plein la vue.

Non seulement les images et vidéos sont époustouflantes, mais les légendes pédagogiques expliquent les phénomènes et renvoient vers les missions concernées (Hubble, SDO, LRO, Fermi, etc.). En 2026, le compte mise aussi sur les formats carrousel et Reels pour décrypter l’actualité scientifique sans perdre l’émerveillement. Une belle façon d’en apprendre plus sur l’espace… tout en ayant des étoiles dans les yeux. Difficile de décrocher !

Regardez par vous-même (archives 2015–2016) :

Despite its unassuming appearance, the edge-on spiral galaxy captured in the left half of this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image is actually quite remarkable. Located about one billion light-years away in the constellation of Eridanus, this striking galaxy — known as LO95 0313-192 — has a spiral shape similar to that of the Milky Way. It has a large central bulge, and arms speckled with brightly glowing gas mottled by thick lanes of dark dust. Its companion, sitting in the right of the frame, is known rather unpoetically as [LOY2001] J031549.8-190623. Jets, outbursts of superheated gas moving at close to the speed of light, have long been associated with the cores of giant elliptical galaxies, and galaxies in the process of merging. However, in an unexpected discovery, astronomers found LO95 0313-192, even though it is a spiral galaxy, to have intense radio jets spewing out from its center. The galaxy appears to have two more regions that are also strongly emitting in the radio part of the spectrum, making it even rarer still. The discovery of these giant jets in 2003 — not visible in this image, but indicated in this earlier Hubble composite — has been followed by the unearthing of a further three spiral galaxies containing radio-emitting jets in recent years. This growing class of unusual spirals continues to raise significant questions about how jets are produced within galaxies, and how they are thrown out into the cosmos. Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA; acknowledgement, Judy Schmidt #nasagoddard #hubble #galaxy

A photo posted by NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard) on Jan 29, 2016 at 7:02am PST

Located 16 million light-years away this messy & obscure shaped galaxy is a true rebel — Most galaxies possess a majestic spiral or elliptical structure. About a quarter of galaxies, though, defy such conventional, rounded aesthetics, instead sporting a messy, indefinable shape. Known as irregular galaxies, this group includes NGC 5408, the galaxy that has been snapped here by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. John Herschel recorded the existence of NGC 5408 in June 1834. Astronomers had long mistaken NGC 5408 for a planetary nebula, an expelled cloud of material from an aging star. Instead, bucking labels, NGC 5408 turned out to be an entire galaxy, located about 16 million light-years from Earth in the constellation of Centaurus (The Centaur). In yet another sign of NGC 5408 breaking convention, the galaxy is associated with an object known as an ultraluminous X-ray source, dubbed NGC 5408 X-1, one of the best studied of its class. These rare objects beam out prodigious amounts of energetic X-rays. Astrophysicists believe these sources to be strong candidates for intermediate-mass black holes. This hypothetical type of black hole has significantly less mass than the supermassive black holes found in galactic centers, which can have billions of times the mass of the sun, but have a good deal more mass than the black holes formed when giant stars collapse. Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt #nasagoddard #hubble #space #rebel #galaxy

A photo posted by NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard) on Jan 22, 2016 at 6:59am PST

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) recently captured a unique view of Earth from the spacecraft’s vantage point in orbit around the moon. In this composite image we see Earth appear to rise over the lunar horizon from the viewpoint of the spacecraft, with the center of the Earth just off the coast of Liberia (at 4.04 degrees North, 12.44 degrees West). The large tan area in the upper right is the Sahara Desert, and just beyond is Saudi Arabia. The Atlantic and Pacific coasts of South America are visible to the left. On the moon, we get a glimpse of the crater Compton, which is located just beyond the eastern limb of the moon, on the lunar farside. LRO was launched on June 18, 2009, and has collected a treasure trove of data with its seven powerful instruments, making an invaluable contribution to our knowledge about the moon. LRO experiences 12 earthrises every day; however the spacecraft is almost always busy imaging the lunar surface so only rarely does an opportunity arise such that its camera instrument can capture a view of Earth. Occasionally LRO points off into space to acquire observations of the extremely thin lunar atmosphere and perform instrument calibration measurements. During these movements sometimes Earth (and other planets) pass through the camera’s field of view and dramatic images such as the one shown here are acquired. This image was composed from a series of images taken Oct. 12, when LRO was about 83 miles (134 kilometers) above the moon’s farside crater Compton. Capturing an image of the Earth and moon with LRO’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) instrument is a complicated task. First the spacecraft must be rolled to the side (in this case 67 degrees), then the spacecraft slews with the direction of travel to maximize the width of the lunar horizon in LROC’s Narrow Angle Camera image. All this takes place while LRO is traveling faster than 3,580 miles per hour (over 1,600 meters per second) relative to the lunar surface below the spacecraft! Credit: NASA/Goddard/Arizona State University #nasagoddard #earthrise #moon #earth #bluemarble

A photo posted by NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard) on Dec 23, 2015 at 10:23am PST

This image, constructed from more than six years of observations by NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, is the first to show how the entire sky appears at energies between 50 billion (GeV) and 2 trillion electron volts (TeV). For comparison, the energy of visible light falls between about 2 and 3 electron volts. A diffuse glow fills the sky and is brightest in the middle of the map, along the central plane of our galaxy. The famous Fermi Bubbles, first detected in 2010, appear as red extensions north and south of the galactic center and are much more pronounced at these energies. Discrete gamma-ray sources include pulsar wind nebulae and supernova remnants within our galaxy, as well as distant galaxies called blazars powered by supermassive black holes. Labels show the highest-energy sources, all located within our galaxy and emitting gamma rays exceeding 1 TeV. Credit: NASA/DOE/Fermi LAT Collaboration #nasagoddard #GammaRay

A photo posted by NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard) on Jan 8, 2016 at 12:37pm PST

This side-by-side rendering of the Sun at the same time in two different wavelengths of extreme ultraviolet light helps to visualize the differing features visible in each wavelength (Dec. 10-11, 2015). Most prominently, we can see much finer strands of plasma looping above the surface in the 171 Angstrom wavelength (gold) than in the 304 Angstrom wavelength (red), which captures cooler plasma closer to the Sun’s surface. SDO observes the Sun in 10 different wavelengths with each one capturing somewhat different features at various temperatures and elevations above the Sun. Credit: NASA/Goddard/Solar Dynamics Observatory #nasagoddard #sun #space

A photo posted by NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard) on Jan 5, 2016 at 1:45pm PST

Pour découvrir les images et formats les plus récents (Reels, carrousels, Stories à la Une thématiques), rendez-vous directement sur @nasagoddard et explorez les hashtags #NASAGoddard, #Hubble et #Space pour prolonger l’observation.