William Shatner Pictured Hours After The Death Of Leonard Nimoy @MailOnline

For more on the Fermi Paradox and why alien life hasn’t found us yet. (Infographic via futurism)

What strange world is this? Earth. In the foreground of the featured image are thePinnacles, unusual rock spires in Nambung National Park in Western Australia. Made of ancient sea shells (limestone), how these human-sizedpicturesque spires formed remains unknown. In the background, just past the end of the central Pinnacle, is a bright crescent Moon. The eerie glow around the Moon is mostly zodiacal light, sunlight reflected by dust grains orbiting between the planets in the Solar System. Arching across the top is the central band of our Milky Way Galaxy. Many famous stars and nebula are also visible in the background night sky. The featured 29-panel panorama was taken and composed last September after detailed planning that involved the Moon, the rock spires, and their corresponding shadows. Even so, the strong zodiacal light was a pleasant surprise. Image Credit: Michael Goh

RIP

While flying over Boston, Leonard Nimoy’s birthplace, NASA Astronaut Terry Virts pays tribute to the Star Trek star http://nbcnews.to/1AUElvf

We have been expecting you Mr Handle......

Pluto in Combined Color

What is fascinating about Pluto is how young its surface is. We can see some canyons, planes, and mountains in this image - which is an indication of a young surface. This image of Pluto was taken when the New Horizons spacecraft was only 280,000 miles away from the surface. In the image you can see features as small as 1.4 miles! Four images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) were combined with color data from the Ralph instrument to create this enhanced color global view.

Credit: John’s Hopkin’s APL/NASA JPL

RIP Mr Spock may you live and prosper wherever you are.......

AD ASTRA PER ASPERA........ Lest we forge

LIVE LONG AND PROSPER.....

I met her when I was 10 days old, and him in kindergarten. Now they’re married and I’m the happiest maid of honor ever. Congratulations @britmaack and Ben!

The arrangement of the spiral arms in the galaxy Messier 63, seen here in an image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, recall the pattern at the center of a sunflower. So the nickname for this cosmic object -- the Sunflower Galaxy -- is no coincidence. Discovered by Pierre Mechain in 1779, the galaxy later made it as the 63rd entry into fellow French astronomer Charles Messier's famous catalogue, published in 1781. The two astronomers spotted the Sunflower Galaxy's glow in the small, northern constellation Canes Venatici (the Hunting Dogs). We now know this galaxy is about 27 million light-years away and belongs to the M51 Group -- a group of galaxies, named after its brightest member, Messier 51, another spiral-shaped galaxy dubbed the Whirlpool Galaxy. Galactic arms, sunflowers and whirlpools are only a few examples of nature's apparent preference for spirals. For galaxies like Messier 63 the winding arms shine bright because of the presence of recently formed, blue-white giant stars and clusters, readily seen in this Hubble image.  Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA Text credit: European Space Agency Hubble Space Telescope

Explanation: Big, beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 7331 is often touted as an analog to our ownMilky Way. About 50 million light-years distant in the northern constellation Pegasus, NGC 7331 was recognized early on as a spiral nebulaand is actually one of the brighter galaxies notincluded in Charles Messier''s famous 18th century catalog. Since the galaxy''s disk is inclined to our line-of-sight, long telescopic exposures often result in an image that evokes a strong sense of depth. The effect is further enhanced in this sharp image from a small telescope by galaxies that lie beyond the gorgeous island universe. The most prominent background galaxies are about one tenth theapparent size of NGC 7331 and so lie roughly ten times farther away. Their close alignment on the sky with NGC 7331 occurs just by chance. Seen through faint foreground dust clouds lingering above the plane of Milky Way, this visual grouping of galaxies is known as theDeer Lick Group.