Skip Navigation
menu close modal
Resources

AG Carinae

On a background dotted with small stars, AG Carinae appears as a giant eye in the sky. At the center is a bright white ball of light, and surrounding it is a ring of electric blue light and pale red light.
Credit: NASA, ESA, STScI
Published: April 23, 2021

The mighty blue giant AG Carinae is one of the brightest stars in our Milky Way galaxy. It shines with the brilliance of 1 million suns. The Hubble Space Telescope snapped an image of this particularly large outburst.

More information: https://hubblesite.org/contents/news-releases/2021/news-2021-017

Explore the Universe

Related

NASA's TESS captured this image of comet C/2018 N1.
More
On a gray background a bright ball of light travels across the image from the right side to the left, at a slight angle upward. There are also other small dots sprinkled throughout the image, which mostly remain stationary throughout.
TESS Catches a Comet
NASA's Spitzer captured this mosaic image of the Cepheus C and Cepheus B regions in the constellation Cepheus.
More
Two cloudy nebula appear in this image, each in shades of green, yellow and red. One appears to blast across the image from the lower left just about to the top of the image just the right of center. At the top end the nebua had a bright white spot with a red halo, and trailing behind to the lower left of the image is a semi-transparent green cloud looking like a dress trailing behind. Taking up the lower right portion of the image is a compact green bundle of clouds, with just a thin strip of black sky between the two nebulae.
Cepheus C & Cepheus B
This illustration explains the strong force, one of the four fundamental forces in the universe.
More
This infographic is done mostly in shades of blue. At the top left is the title: "Strong Force." Below that is a block of text that reads: "The strong force holds together things that have the same charge. It's stronger than the electromagnetic force, so that's why atoms with multiple protons and neutrons don't fly apart. But most importantly, it holds together the quarks that make up protons and neutrons themselves. Each proton contains two up quarks and one down. Each neutron contains two down quarks and one up." Below and to the right of the text is an illustration of an atomic nucleus made of two blue protons and two red neutrons. To the left is a pop out that points back to one of the neutrons. This pop out shows a cluster of one yellow up quark and two pink down quarks. Dual directional arrows connect each quark to the other two. To the left of the nuclei is a pop out that points back to one of the protons. This pop out shows a cluster of two yellow quarks and one pink down quark. Dual directional arrows connect each quark to the other two.
Strong Force
¡Ninguna nave espacial te protegerá de la cegadora destrucción de los demonios de rayos gamma!
More
Dos astronautas están sobre un asteroide, mirando un par de estrellas de neutrones, o los núcleos de estrellas colapsadas, chocar en la distancia. El resultado de la colisión son haces de luz brillantes y concentrados llamados rayos gamma. Los estallidos de rayos gamma evitan por poco impactar a los astronautas al ser emitidos desde la colisión.
Demonios de Rayos Gamma – "Galaxy of Horrors" póster (En Español)
This image shows a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launching with NASA's IXPE onboard.
More
Against a dark background, a rocket launches. Visible is a nest of clouds on the ground with a bright plume of fire rising up to the top of the image. A structure is silhouetted to the left of the plume, and a water tower is visible just to the right.
IXPE Launches to Explore the Secrets of the Universe
NASA's Swift imaged rings of X-ray light centered on V404 Cygni, a binary system containing an erupting black hole.
More
This animated GIF shows rings of X-rays, shown in red, that expand away from a central white dot, like a bullseye target.
X-ray Echoes Create Black Hole Bull's-eye
¡Esta galaxia escalofriantemente encantada dejó de crear estrellas, de manera misteriosa, solo unos pocos miles de millones de años tras el big bang!
More
Una estrella escarlata se cierne tras las ruinas de un exoplaneta que se asemeja en su forma a una calavera. Un brazo de galaxia rojo es visible en el fondo. Es evidente que esta galaxia, llamada MACS 2129-1, ha estado deteriorándose desde que dejó de producir estrellas solo unos pocos miles de millones de años después del Big Bang.
Cementerio Galáctico – "Galaxy of Horrors" póster (En Español)
These images show the steadily improving view of the Moon’s gamma-ray glow from NASA’s Fermi.
More
The image is broken up into a grid of eight panels. The first panel has text that reads: “Fermi Images the Moon. These images show the Fermi mission’s improving view of the Moon’s gamma-ray glow. Brighter colors correspond to greater numbers of gamma rays above 31 million electron volts, tens of millions of times the energy of visible light. At these energies, the Moon is actually brighter than the Sun. The glow comes from cosmic rays, particles that constantly bombard the lunar surface. The Moon has no magnetic field, which would screen out lower-energy particles. So instead they strike and interact with the surface, which produces gamma rays. Credit: NASA/DOE/Fermi LAT Collaboration.” The first panel also includes a visible-light image of the Moon, which is small in the center of the panel. The subsequent panels are labeled 2 months, 4 months, 8 months, 16 months, 32 months, 64 months, and 128 months. Each shows a bright yellow region in the middle surrounded by a haze of orange that fades into light red at the edges of the image. The first image is extremely pixelated, with the the central circle coming into more focus with each subsequent image.
Fermi Sees the Moon in Gamma Rays
This image shows the entire gamma-ray sky using 12 years of data from NASA's Fermi.
More
This image shows the sky as you would see it in gamma-ray light. It is an oval, which represents the sky folded out onto a flat surface. The oval is primarily blue, showing a background of gamma-rays that permeates the entire sky. A bright band in shades of yellow, orange, and red goes across the center of the image from left to right, which shows gamma rays from the plane of the Milky Way. There are dots of yellow and red throughout the rest of the image, indicating distant galaxies that emit gamma rays.
Fermi's 12-year View of the Gamma-ray Sky
A brilliant tapestry of young stars flaring to life resembles a glittering fireworks display in this Hubble image.
More
This image shows a dense cluster of stars just offset to the right from center. The stars in the cluster are predominantly white tinted with red. Across the entire image are additional stars with both red-tinted and blue-tinted stars. There is a pillowy nebula taking up the left side and bottom of the image. Within the nebula, several pillars of dark, dense gas are being shaped by the energetic light and strong stellar winds from the brilliant cluster of thousands of stars.
Hubble Spots Fireworks in Westerlund 2
Something strange and mysterious creeps throughout the cosmos. Scientists call it dark matter.
More
A luminous web is visible in the night sky beyond a treeline. Scattered between the nodes of the web is darkness, signifying the presence of dark matter. In the center of the web, the darkness melds to form the shape of a spider.
Dark Matter – "Galaxy of Horrors" poster (English)
This simulated image of part of the Andromeda galaxy highlights the potential of NASA’s upcoming Roman mission.
More
This image shows the detector “footprint” of NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. Six columns of three squares are arranged such that the top of the middle two columns are close to the top of the image, the next two columns are a little lower down, and the two outer columns are even lower. Within these square are seen a simulated image that has a background of pale black dotted with stars. The squares on the lower left side have brighter light, which would represent regions of the sky closer to the center of the Andromeda galaxy.
Simulated Image Demonstrates Roman's Future Power
The blue dots in this field of galaxies were detected by NASA's NuSTAR.
More
On a field of black there are small yellow and red dots spread across the image. About a dozen larger, blue dots are scattered amongst the smaller, paler sources.
A Black Hole 'Choir'
NASA's WISE captured this image of the Andromeda galaxy, also called Messier 31 or M31.
More
M31 is a spiral galaxy seen in this image against a black sky speckled with blue points of light. It appears like a flying disk toy seen tilted up and to the left, with a bright orange circle of light and tendrils of orange and pale blue light swirling in toward a central bright, white spot.
WISE Studies Our Neighbor Andromeda
Algo extraño y misterioso se arrastra por el cosmos. Los científicos lo llaman materia oscura.
More
Una red luminosa es visible en el cielo nocturno más allá del límite de un bosque. Dispersa entre los nodos de la red está la oscuridad, que denota la presencia de materia oscura. En el centro de la telaraña, la oscuridad se funde para crear la forma de una araña.
Materia Oscura – "Galaxy of Horrors" póster (En Español)
This far-off blue planet may look like a friendly haven – but don’t be deceived! Weather here is deadly.
More
A poster done in the style of a vintage poster for a horror movie. Reading "Rains of Terror," it's death by a million cuts on this slasher planet. Jagged edges of glass can be seen battering a spacecraft on this alien world.
Rains of Terror – "Galaxy of Horrors" poster (English)
This NASA NuSTAR image reveals high-energy X-rays from radioactive material in Cassiopeia A.
More
This image of X-ray light from a supernova remnant shows a nearly-circular mess of colors representing different wavelengths of X-ray light. Near the center is a blotchy patch of electric blue light. Surrounding and interweaving with that are wisps of yellow, orange and red. A plume of green juts out on the left side of the blast, with green edging around the orange light on the top and bottom of the blast. And a faint ring of pale yellow light surrounds the main ball of color.
Untangling the Remains of Cassiopeia A
Astronomers combined several Hubble Space Telescope images to create this view of the Pillars of Creation.
More
On a background awash in blue and orange cloudy light stands a darker cloud with three pillars rising from it. The edges of the dark regions glow with white and light-blue light.
Hubble Studies the Pillars of Creation
This festive portrait of our Milky Way galaxy comes from ESA's Planck mission.
More
This oval image represents a view of the entire sky unfolded and laid out flat. Running horizontally across the middle of the oval is a bright line of white, which is light emitted by gas and dust in the plane of the Milky Way. Mottled red fills the oval with a few areas of yellow, especially along the plane of the Milky Way and extending above and below it. Over all of this, in the center, is a thick ring of blue.
A Milky Way 'Mixer' Amongst the Stars
This is a mosaic the entire sky as observed by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE).
More
The image is an oval, which represents the sky folded out onto a flat surface. There is an electric blue, fuzzy light running left to right in the center of the image, showing emission from the plane of our Milky Way galaxy. About half way between the center of the image and the left edge, that blue line turns green and expands out into diffuse clouds. That blue line similarly expands into diffuse green clouds on the right side, too. Most of the rest of the image appears black with just a few spots of dim green clouds dotted around the image.
The WISE Infrared Sky
NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission captured this mosaic of the Heart and Soul nebulae.
More
A starry background is covered by green clouds of material. There are two reddish bubbles, each surrounded by a thin tendril of pale green light, one lies at the lower left of the image, the other in the center right.
WISE Sees the Heart and Soul Nebulae
This visualization shows gamma rays detected by NASA's Fermi during a flare from galaxy 3C 279.
More
This GIF shows a representation of a gamma-ray flare from an active galaxy. Throughout the animation, circles appear that then expand like raindrops on water in varying sizes and shades of magenta. The smaller circles with lighter colors represent lower energy gamma rays, and the larger circles with darker colors are higher energy gamma rays. The animation starts with just a few of these drops across the image, with the density increasing and more large drops appearing in the center of the image toward the end, until the image is nearly filled with the expanding circles.
Fermi Spots Record Flare from Blazar 3C 279
This image from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) features comet 65/P Gunn.
More
Comet 65/P Gunn looks like a match with a flame against a starry background. A thin stripe of red runs from the left side of the image almost to the middle where a bright red and yellow ball flares up with a tail tapering off to the right.
WISE Catches Comet 65-P Gunn
This composite image of Centaurus A shows magnetic fields streamlines over an image of the galaxy.
More
In the center of a black, starry background is a galaxy with two long jets. The galaxy shown in shades of white, orange, and brown looks like a thick pancake tilted to the left. The pancake appears furry with lines representing magnetic information from SOFIA embedded in the disk of the galaxy. From the center of the pancake, above and below it, are two plumes of orange that look like steam rising from a hot cup of tea.
Centaurus A
An image from NASA’s Chandra shows the location of several elements produced by the explosion of Cassiopeia A.
More
In the center of a black background is a large circular object outlined by electric blue filaments that jolt and weave throughout the structure. The object, which is the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A, includes strings of vibrant colors including purple, orange, yellow and blue.
Chandra Reveals Elementary Nature of Cassiopeia A

Explore the Universe

Related News

NGC 3156 is a lenticular galaxy, with two visible threads of dark reddish-brown dust crossing the galaxy’s disk.
More
Hubble Spots a Dreamy Galaxy
Hubble Spots a Dreamy Galaxy
The swirls of the galaxy IC 1776 stand in splendid isolation in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Images a Swirling Supernova Site
Hubble Images a Swirling Supernova Site
This colorful image is an example of how dust in space affects starlight coming from background objects.
More
Hubble Sees Glittering Globular Cluster Embedded Inside Our Milky Way
Hubble Sees Glittering Globular Cluster Embedded Inside Our Milky Way
When a star strays too close to a black hole, gravitational forces create tides that break the star apart into a stream of gas.
More
NASA's Swift Learns a New Trick, Spots a Snacking Black Hole
NASA's Swift Learns a New Trick, Spots a Snacking Black Hole
This huge ball of stars – around 100 billion in total – is an elliptical galaxy located some 55 million light-years away.
More
Hubble Views a Sphere of Stars
Hubble Views a Sphere of Stars
This galaxy in the constellation Eridanus is a ghostly assemblage of stars which resembles a sparkling cloud.
More
Hubble Sees a Sparkling Neighbor Galaxy
Hubble Sees a Sparkling Neighbor Galaxy
This distant galaxy cluster is a cosmic leviathan that is highly luminous at X-ray wavelengths.
More
Hubble Captures Cosmic Cluster
Hubble Captures Cosmic Cluster
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope continued observations of the farthest star ever detected in the very distant universe.
More
Webb Reveals Colors of Earendel, Most Distant Star Ever Detected
Webb Reveals Colors of Earendel, Most Distant Star Ever Detected
The glittering, glitzy contents of the globular cluster NGC 6652 sparkle in this star-studded image.
More
Hubble Glimpses a Glitzy Galactic Cluster
Hubble Glimpses a Glitzy Galactic Cluster
The tranquil spiral galaxy UGC 12295 basks leisurely in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Peers at a Tranquil Galaxy
Hubble Peers at a Tranquil Galaxy
A young planet whirling around a petulant red dwarf star is changing in unpredictable ways orbit-by-orbit.
More
Hubble Sees Evaporating Planet Getting the Hiccups
Hubble Sees Evaporating Planet Getting the Hiccups
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope captured a pair of actively forming young stars, known as Herbig-Haro 46/47.
More
Webb Snaps Highly Detailed Infrared Image of Actively Forming Stars
Webb Snaps Highly Detailed Infrared Image of Actively Forming Stars
The irregular galaxy Arp 263 lurks in the background of this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Images a Starstruck Galaxy
Hubble Images a Starstruck Galaxy
Research by scientists from NASA and Osaka University suggests that rogue planets far outnumber planets that orbit stars.
More
New Study Reveals NASA's Roman Could Find 400 Earth-Mass Rogue Planets
New Study Reveals NASA's Roman Could Find 400 Earth-Mass Rogue Planets
While our telescopes can’t directly see dark matter, they can help us figure out more about it thanks to a phenomenon called gravitational lensing.
More
How Gravity Warps Light
How Gravity Warps Light
The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a monster in the making in this observation of the exceptional galaxy cluster eMACS J1353.7+4329.
More
Hubble Views a Galactic Monster
Hubble Views a Galactic Monster
To celebrate a successful first year, NASA has released Webb’s image of a small star-forming region in the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex.
More
Webb Celebrates First Year of Science With Close-up on Birth of Sun-like Stars
Webb Celebrates First Year of Science With Close-up on Birth of Sun-like Stars
The spiral galaxy UGC 11860 seems to float serenely against a field of background galaxies in this image from the Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Observes a Stunning Spiral
Hubble Observes a Stunning Spiral
The galaxy ESO 174-1, which resembles a hazy cloud against a backdrop of bright stars, dominates this image from Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Checks in on a Galactic Neighbor
Hubble Checks in on a Galactic Neighbor
Euclid, an ESA mission with contributions from NASA, is set to launch in July to explore why the universe’s expansion is speeding up.
More
NASA's Roman and ESA's Euclid Will Team Up To Investigate Dark Energy
NASA's Roman and ESA's Euclid Will Team Up To Investigate Dark Energy
A team of scientists has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to detect a new carbon compound in space for the first time.
More
Webb Makes First Detection of Crucial Carbon Molecule
Webb Makes First Detection of Crucial Carbon Molecule
The teeming stars of the globular cluster NGC 6544 glisten in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Glimpses a Glistening Cluster
Hubble Glimpses a Glistening Cluster
The galaxy NGC 7292 billows across this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Captures a Billowing Irregular Galaxy
Hubble Captures a Billowing Irregular Galaxy
New data from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has pinpointed the reason gas between stars and galaxies turned transparent.
More
NASA's Webb Proves Galaxies Transformed the Early Universe
NASA's Webb Proves Galaxies Transformed the Early Universe
The jellyfish galaxy JO206 trails across this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
More
Hubble Observes a Cosmic Sea Creature
Hubble Observes a Cosmic Sea Creature