Sky Digest
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The Week Ahead
| Thu | Fri | Sat | Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed |
| 🌒 16% | 🌒 25% | 🌓 35% | 🌓 46% | 🌔 57% | 🌔 68% | 🌔 79% |
| — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day
LDN 1622: Dark Nebula in Orion
The silhouette of an intriguing dark nebula inhabits this cosmic scene. Lynds' Dark Nebula (LDN) 1622 appears against a faint background of glowing hydrogen gas only visible in long telescopic exposures of the region. In contrast, a brighter reflection nebula, vdB 62, is more easily seen just above the dusty dark nebula. LDN 1622 lies near the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy, close on the sky to Barnard's Loop, a large cloud surrounding the rich complex of emission nebulae found in the Belt and Sword of Orion. With swept-back outlines, the obscuring dust of LDN 1622 is thought to lie at a similar distance, perhaps 1,500 light-years away. At that distance, this 3 degree wide field of view would span about 100 light-years. Young stars do lie hidden within the dark expanse and have been revealed in Spitzer Space telescope infrared images. Still, the foreboding visual appearance of LDN 1622 inspires its popular name, the Boogeyman Nebula.
Image credit: Chris Fellows — APOD is a service of NASA and Michigan Tech. U.
View on NASA APODSpace News
NASA awarded Intuitive Machines $180.4 million to deliver science payloads to the lunar surface as part of the Artemis program, advancing NASA's goal of sustained lunar exploration.
NASA — 27 Mar 2026
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NASA — 27 Mar 2026
NASA released the launch countdown for Artemis II, targeting no earlier than April 1, 2026, for the first crewed mission around the Moon with four astronauts.
NASA — 26 Mar 2026
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ESA — 27 Mar 2026
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