1. Sun's Embrace
An observer in Colorado stands framed by a partial solar eclipse in a picture taken last week and submitted to National Geographic's My Shot.
Solar eclipses happen when the moon lines up between Earth and the sun. But in the most recent case, known as an annular eclipse, the dark moon's apparent diameter was smaller than the visible disk of the sun, so that it left a ring - or annulus - of fiery light around the edges.
2. Rainbow Pinwheel
Four NASA space telescopes recently teamed up to create this new image of M101, aka the Pinwheel galaxy. The colorized composite will help astronomers map the different kinds of activity happening in this large spiral galaxy.
Red, for instance, represents infrared light spied by the Spitzer Space Telescope, which shows dust lanes that are heated up where new stars are forming. Visible light from the Hubble Space Telescope, shown in yellow, comes from stars that trace the paths of the dust lanes.
Blue regions show ultraviolet light captured by the Galaxy Evolution Explorer, which reveals hot, young stars that formed about a million years ago. Finally, data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory, coloured purple, lets us see high-energy emissions from supernovae, superheated gas, and hot matter falling into black holes.
3. Golden Seas
The setting sun turns the Pacific Ocean into liquid gold, smeared by inky shadows from low-hanging clouds, as seen by an astronaut aboard the International Space Station earlier this month.
The picture was snapped as the orbiting laboratory passed over the Andes Mountains of central Chile.
4. Solar Wrinkles
A "squashed tomato" sun rises over Vietnam's Quang Ngai beach in a picture recently submitted to National Geographic's My Shot.
The solar disk can appear distorted when it's near the horizon, because its light is being refracted - or bent - by more of Earth's atmosphere. Similarly, rising and setting suns often appear redder because the thicker atmospheric layers scatter more blue light, leaving mostly red wavelengths.
5. Snared Dragon
SpaceX's unmanned Dragon capsule is grappled by the robotic arm on the International Space Station in a picture taken from the station.
Last week the cargo craft successfully became the first commercial vehicle to dock with the ISS. Dragon spent about a week attached to the orbiting lab before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean Thursday morning.
6. Sun Hoop
A rainbow ring loops around the sun in a picture taken from Vancouver, Canada, and recently submitted to National Geographic's Your Shot.
The solar halo is an optical effect created by ice crystals in high-altitude clouds, which refract sunlight and split it into its component colours.
Top image – Left: The space station's robotic arm grapples SpaceX's Dragon capsule in a NASA video still. Right: A composite image of the Messier 81 (M81) galaxy.
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