The Andromeda galaxy, also known as Messier 31 (M31), is the closest spiral galaxy to the Milky Way at a distance of about 2.5 million light-years. This new composite image contains data of M31 taken by some of the world’s most powerful telescopes in different kinds of light. This image is released in tribute to the groundbreaking legacy of Dr. Vera Rubin, whose observations transformed our understanding of the universe.

NASA astronaut Bob Hines took this picture of the waning crescent moon on May 8, 2022, as the International Space Station flew into an orbital sunrise 260 miles above the Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of the United States.

NASA astronaut Zena Cardman inspects her spacesuit’s wrist mirror at the NASA Johnson Space Center photo studio on March 22, 2024.

Arsia Mons, one of the Red Planet’s largest volcanoes, peeks through a blanket of water ice clouds in this image captured by NASA’s 2001 Mars Odyssey orbiter on May 2, 2025.

This full-disk image from NOAA’s GOES-13 satellite shows the Americas at the start of astronomical summer in the Northern Hemisphere on June 21, 2012.

More than 500 students with 75 teams from around the world participated in the 31st year of NASA’s Human Exploration Rover Challenge (HERC) on April 11 and April 12, 2025, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Participating teams represented 35 colleges and universities, 38 high schools, and two middle schools from 20 states, Puerto Rico, and 16 other nations.

A curious cow watches as NASA astronauts Andre Douglas and Kate Rubins perform a simulated moonwalk in the San Francisco Volcanic Field in Northern Arizona on May 14, 2024.

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the barred spiral galaxy IC 758.

Attendees line up to enter the theater for a screening of the new NASA+ documentary “Cosmic Dawn: The Untold Story of the James Webb Space Telescope,” Wednesday, June 11, 2025, at the Greenbelt Cinema in Greenbelt, Maryland. Featuring never-before-seen footage, Cosmic Dawn offers an unprecedented glimpse into the assembly, testing, and launch of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope.

The star cluster Pismis 24 lies within the much larger emission nebula called NGC 6357, located about 8,000 light-years from Earth. The gas below the stars glows through ionization caused by intense ultraviolet radiation from the massive young stars within the cluster.