Subj : Daily APOD Report To : All From : Ben Ritchey Date : Sun Jan 06 2019 01:18:45 Astronomy Picture of the Day Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! [1] Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. 2019 January 6 [2] A Laser Strike at the Galactic Center Image Credit: Yuri Beletsky [3] (Carnegie [4] Las Campanas Observatory [5] , TWAN [6] ), ESO [7] Explanation: Why are these people shooting a powerful laser into the center of our Galaxy? Fortunately, this is not meant to be the first step in a Galactic war [8] . Rather, astronomers at the Very Large Telescope [9] (VLT) site in Chile [10] are trying to measure the distortions of Earth's ever changing atmosphere [11] . Constant imaging of high-altitude atoms excited by the laser [12] -- which appear like an artificial star [13] -- allow astronomers to instantly measure atmospheric blurring [14] . This information is fed back to a VLT telescope mirror [15] which is then slightly deformed [16] to minimize this blurring. In this case [17] , a VLT was observing our Galaxy's center [18] , and so Earth's atmospheric blurring in that direction was needed. As for inter-galaxy warfare, when viewed from our Galaxy's center [19] , no casualties are expected. In fact, the light from this powerful laser [20] would combine with light from our Sun [21] to together appear only as bright [22] as a faint and distant star. APOD in other languages: Arabic [23] , Catalan [24] , Chinese [25] (Beijing), Chinese [26] (Taiwan), Croatian [27] , Czech [28] , Dutch [29] , German [30] , French [31] , French [32] , Hebrew [33] , Indonesian [34] , Japanese [35] , Korean [36] , Montenegrin [37] , Polish [38] , Russian [39] , Serbian [40] , Slovenian [41] and Spanish [42] Tomorrow's picture: busy bull ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- < [43] | Archive [44] | Submissions [45] | Index [46] | Search [47] | Calendar [48] | RSS [49] | Education [50] | About APOD [51] | Discuss [52] | > [53] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff [54] (MTU [55] ) & Jerry Bonnell [56] (UMCP [57] ) NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply [58] . NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices [59] A service of: ASD [60] at NASA [61] / GSFC [62] & Michigan Tech. U. [63] ---------- Site notes: [1] archivepix.html [2] image/1901/vltlaser_beletsky_1400.jpg [3] https://www.instagram.com/yuribeletsky/ [4] http://carnegiescience.edu/ [5] http://www.lco.cl/ [6] http://www.twanight.org/ [7] https://www.eso.org/ [8] https://youtu.be/nohQReM7BpI [9] ap000707.html [10] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chile [11] ap000725.html [12] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3SBSbsdiYg [13] ap050207.html [14] http://www2.keck.hawaii.edu/optics/lgsao/lgsbasics.html [15] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_test [16] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_optics [17] https://www.eso.org/public/images/potw1036a/ [18] ap180729.html [19] ap050403.html [20] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66aVXk5jSn8 [21] https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/solar-system/sun/overview/ [22] ap160926.html [23] http://www.apodar.com/ [24] http://www.apod.cat/ [25] http://www.bjp.org.cn/apod/today.html [26] http://sprite.phys.ncku.edu.tw/astrolab/mirrors/apod/ apod.html [27] http://www.apod.rs/Croatia.html [28] http://www.astro.cz/apod/ [29] http://www.apod.nl/ [30] http://www.starobserver.org/ [31] http://www.cidehom.com/apod.php [32] https://www.apod.tv/ [33] http://www.astronomia2009.org.il/info/apod/apod.htm [34] http://apod.infoastronomy.org/ [35] http://home.u05.itscom.net/apodjpn/apodj/apodj0.htm [36] http://wouldyoulike.org/apod/ [37] http://www.apod.rs/Montenegro.html [38] http://apod.pl/apod/ [39] http://www.astronet.ru/db/apod.html [40] http://www.apod.rs/ [41] http://apod.fmf.uni-lj.si/ [42] http://observatorio.info/ [43] ap190105.html [44] archivepix.html [45] lib/apsubmit2015.html [46] lib/aptree.html [47] https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apod/apod_search [48] calendar/allyears.html [49] /apod.rss [50] lib/edlinks.html [51] lib/about_apod.html [52] http://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?date=190106 [53] ap190107.html [54] http://www.phy.mtu.edu/faculty/Nemiroff.html [55] http://www.phy.mtu.edu/ [56] https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/htmltest/jbonnell/www/bonnell.html [57] http://www.astro.umd.edu/ [58] lib/about_apod.html#srapply [59] https://www.nasa.gov/about/highlights/HP_Privacy.html [60] https://astrophysics.gsfc.nasa.gov/ [61] https://www.nasa.gov/ [62] https://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/ [63] http://www.mtu.edu/ --- Mystic BBS v1.12 A42 (Windows/32) * Origin: FIDONet - The Positronium Repository (1:393/68) .