Radiant Horizons

The stars and dust lanes of the Milky Way hang above telescope domes in this richly hued image of Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), a program of NSF’s NOIRLab. The two bright, wispy ovals to the right are the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, dwarf galaxies visible only in the southern hemisphere. The band of color along the horizon is a phenomenon known as airglow, a visible reaction between molecules in Earth’s atmosphere and solar radiation. In this picture are the Curtis Schmidt Telescope (left), the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope (middle), and the SMARTS 1.5-meter Telescope (right). These telescopes, alongside 12 others, comprise CTIO, the principal ground-based optical platform for US astronomical investigation of the southern skies.

Credit:

CTIO/NSF’s NOIRLab/AURA/H. Stockebrand

About the Image

Id:iotw2017a
Type:Photographic
Release date:April 22, 2020, 3 a.m.
Related releases:noirlab2030, noirlab2026
Size:8255 x 3613 px

About the Object


Image Formats

Large JPEGLarge JPEG
8.8 MB
Screensize JPEGScreensize JPEG
180.6 KB

Zoomable


Wallpapers

1024x7681024x768
304.4 KB
1280x10241280x1024
496.4 KB
1600x12001600x1200
709.7 KB
1920x12001920x1200
823.0 KB
2048x15362048x1536
3.9 MB