Astronomy Picture of the Day

   [1]Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                2026 July 31
    [2]See Explanation. Clicking on the picture will download the highest
                        resolution version available.

                        NGC 4372 and the Dark Doodad
          Image Credit & [3]Copyright: [4]Alessandro Cipolat Bares

   Explanation: The Dark Doodad Nebula drifts [5]through southern skies, a
   tantalizing target for binoculars toward the small constellation
   [6]Musca, The Fly. A dusty interstellar cloud, it's seen against rich
   starfields just south of the Coalsack Nebula and the Southern Cross.
   Stretching for about 3 degrees across this telescopic field of view,
   [7]the Dark Doodad is punctuated near its southern tip (upper right) by
   yellowish globular star cluster [8]NGC 4372. Of course NGC 4372 roams
   the halo of our [9]Milky Way galaxy, a background object some 20,000
   light-years away and only by chance along our line-of-sight to the Dark
   Doodad. About 700 light-years distant and over 30 light-years long, the
   Dark Doodad's well defined silhouette belongs to the [10]potentially
   star-forming [11]Musca molecular cloud. The dusty Dark Doodad's
   delightfully alliterative moniker was first coined by [12]astro-imager
   and writer Dennis di Cicco in 1986 while observing Comet Halley from
   the Australian outback.

                     Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
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      Authors & editors: [24]Robert Nemiroff ([25]MTU) & Jerry Bonnell
                                 ([26]UMCP)
          NASA Official: Amber Straughn [27]Specific rights apply.
            [28]NASA Web Privacy, [29]Accessibility, [30]Notices;
                A service of: [31]ASD at [32]NASA / [33]GSFC,
                         [34]NASA Science Activation
                           & [35]Michigan Tech. U.

References

   1. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
   2. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/2607/DARK-DOODAD_2048.jpg
   3. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html#srapply
   4. https://www.flickr.com/photos/astrobares/
   5. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap210101.html
   6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musca
   7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Doodad_Nebula
   8. http://spider.seds.org/spider/MWGC/n4372.html
   9. https://science.nasa.gov/resource/the-milky-way-galaxy/
  10. https://arxiv.org/abs/1507.03742
  11. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2024A&A...687L...9E/abstract
  12. https://www.minorplanetcenter.net/db_search/show_object?utf8=✓&object_id=dicicco
  13. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260730.html
  14. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
  15. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/apsubmit2015.html
  16. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/aptree.html
  17. https://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/apod/apod_search
  18. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/calendar/allyears.html
  19. https://apod.com/feed.rss
  20. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/edlinks.html
  21. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html
  22. https://asterisk.apod.com/discuss_apod.php?date=260731
  23. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap260801.html
  24. https://www.mtu.edu/physics/department/faculty/nemiroff/
  25. https://www.mtu.edu/physics
  26. https://www.astro.umd.edu/
  27. https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/lib/about_apod.html#srapply
  28. https://www.nasa.gov/about/highlights/HP_Privacy.html
  29. https://www.nasa.gov/general/accessibility/
  30. https://www.nasa.gov/privacy/
  31. https://astrophysics.gsfc.nasa.gov/
  32. https://www.nasa.gov/
  33. https://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/
  34. https://science.nasa.gov/learners
  35. http://www.mtu.edu/