Best Space Photos of the Week: Cat's Paw, Solar Horns, Martian Ripples

Hi, Hokusai!

Image courtesy JHUAPL/CIW/NASA

NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft snapped this close-up view of the 59-mile-wide (95-kilometer-wide) Hokusai crater on September 17, while orbiting Mercury.

Sporting grand central peaks and an extensive set of bright rays that extend for 600 miles (1,000 kilometers), Hokusai is believed to be one of the youngest impact sites on the solar system's innermost planet.

Published September 27, 2013

Flaming Horns

Image courtesy SOHO/ESA/NASA

Are those devil's horns sprouting from the underside of the sun? Nope, this ultraviolet image snapped by NASA's STEREO space probe reveals twin arcs of super-heated gas, called solar prominences, flung into space by Sol on September 14.

Heated to thousands of degrees, these giant filaments of plasma are twisted into intricate ribbons by the powerful magnetic fields surrounding giant groups of sunspots.

Published September 27, 2013

Desert Oasis

Image courtesy ESA

Resembling Braille letters, irrigated agricultural plots dot the Sahara in southeastern Libya. The view was captured by Japan's ALOS satellite and released on September 20.

Each plot is 0.6 mile (1 kilometer) wide. Between the city of Al Jawf, seen in the upper left of this image, and the circular plots are the two parallel runways of the local airport.

Published September 27, 2013

Windblown Dunes

Image courtesy U. Arizona/NASA

Rippled, wind-blown sediments stretch across the Martian surface, as seen from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) on August 31.

Shaped by Martian weather over great periods of time, the light ripples of coarse stones crisscross dark sand dunes. Here, they can be seen filling in the upper stretch of the Valles Marineris, the Grand Canyon of Mars.

Published September 27, 2013

Rocket Frog

Photograph courtesy Chris Perry, NASA  

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Published September 27, 2013