Happy Thought for 24 April 2026

 Have a Happy Thought:

We live on an incredible planet, in an incredible universe.

And I have pics to support this claim, from the very large to the very small:

Image: The Vela Supernova Remnant, an expanding nebula of cosmic debris left over from a massive star that exploded about 11,000 years ago. This image was taken with the Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera (DECam), at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile.

Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA, Image Processing: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF NOIRLab), M. Zamani & D. de Martin (NSF NOIRLab)

Earthset captured through the Orion spacecraft window at 6:41 p.m. EDT, April 6, 2026, during the Artemis II crew’s flyby of the Moon. A muted blue Earth with bright white clouds sets behind the cratered lunar surface. The dark portion of Earth is experiencing nighttime. On Earth’s day side, swirling clouds are visible over the Australia and Oceania region. In the foreground, Ohm crater has terraced edges and a flat floor interrupted by central peaks—formed when the surface rebounded upward during the impact that created the crater.

Image Credit: NASA

 

This galaxy-like ‘SpaceX spiral’ was photographed over Iceland in early March, against a backdrop of the Northern Lights. The phenomenon is caused by sunlight bouncing off frozen crystals of excess fuel as they are jettisoned by a spinning rocket. The rocket — a SpaceX Falcon 9 that had blasted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California — released more than 50 small satellites into low Earth orbit before burning up in the atmosphere over the Barents Sea.

Credit: Seung Hye Yang

Researchers think that wall paintings in an Argentinian cave called Cueva Huenul could be thousands of years older than previously estimated, a finding that would make them the oldest cave art in Patagonia — a region that covers the southern tip of South America. Radiocarbon dating of some of the plant-based pigments used to draw abstract shapes suggests that some of the art was created up to 8,200 years ago. Scientists think that the drawings could have been a way for many generations of people to share information at a time when very dry conditions in Patagonia presented a challenge for hunter-gatherers.

Credit: Miguel Lo Bianco/Reuters

Night-time snap of a long-tongued bat (Glossophaga sp.) preparing to feed on a banana plant in Costa Rica. Research shows that some of these bats are adapting to feed predominantly on banana nectar, as their natural forest habitats are replaced with plantations.

Credit: Marilyn Taylor 

Red ants are incredibly strong relative to their size, capable of lifting 10-50 times their own body weight. Microscopically, they can support up to 5,700 times their body weight. They possess powerful mandibles, painful venomous stings, and can form “super-colonies” of millions. Ants actually have four to five times more odour receptors than most other insects. It’s this exceptional sense of smell that helps ants find food.

Credit: Dikye Ariani

 

This arrangement slide was created by the microscopist using samples from Sagami Bay, Japan. It’s a stunning collection of diatoms, foraminifera, sponge spicules, sea cucumber spicules, soft coral spicules, seashells, and more.

Credit: @co_micro. Captured using an Olympus BH2 microscope.

 

 

 

Thanks to Nature.com for inspiring this post, and bringing many of these images directly to us.

You can also check out Magnificent Microorganisms—Our Most Popular Microscope Images for September 2023 | Olympus LS for the super-small

And Artemis II Lunar Flyby - NASA for more photos of the moon and Earth.