Explore how rivers move, change, and sustain life across the planet.
Using data from the SWOT (Surface Water and Ocean Topography) mission, jointly developed by the NASA/JPL and the Centre National d’Études Spatiales with contributions from the Canadian Space Agency and the United Kingdom Space Agency, scientists can now measure rivers continuously and across the entire globe for the first time in human history.
From the Mississippi River to the Amazon, these observations reveal how rivers flow, how they change over time, and how they support ecosystems, economies, and communities worldwide like never before.
NASA’s Hubble Revisits Crab Nebula to Track 25 Years of Expansion
This 2024 image that NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured of the Crab Nebula, paired with its past observations and those of other telescopes, allows astronomers to study how the supernova remnant is expanding and evolving over time.
Credits: Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
A quarter-century after its first observations of the full Crab Nebula, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has taken a fresh look at the supernova remnant. The result is an unparalleled, detailed look at the aftermath of a supernova and how it has evolved over Hubble’s long lifetime. A paper detailing the new Hubble observation is published in The Astrophysical Journal.
This new Hubble observation continues a legacy that stretches back nearly 1,000 years, when astronomers in 1054 recorded the supernova as an impressively bright new star that, for weeks, was visible even during the day. The Crab Nebula is the aftermath of SN 1054, located 6,500 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus.
“We tend to think of the sky as being unchanging, immutable,” said astronomer William Blair of Johns Hopkins University, who led the new observations. “However, with the longevity of the Hubble Space Telescope, even an object like the Crab Nebula is revealed to be in motion, still expanding from the explosion nearly a millennium ago.”
The supernova remnant was discovered in the mid-18th century, and in the 1950s Edwin Hubble was among several astronomers who noted the close correlation between Chinese astronomical records of a supernova and the position of the Crab Nebula. The discovery that the heart of the Crab contained a pulsar — a rapidly rotating neutron star — that was powering the nebula’s expansion finally aligned modern observations and ancient records.
In its new image, Hubble captured the nebula’s intricate filamentary structure, as well as the considerable outward movement of those filaments over 25 years, at a pace of 3.4 million miles per hour. Hubble is the only telescope with the combination of longevity and resolution capable of capturing these detailed changes.
For better comparison with the new image, Hubble’s 1999 image of the Crab was re-processed. The variation of colors in both of the Hubble images shows a combination of changes in local temperature and density of the gas as well as its chemical composition.
This 2024 image that NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured of the Crab Nebula, paired with its past observations and those of other telescopes, allows astronomers to study how the supernova remnant is expanding and evolving over time.
Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
“Even though I’ve worked with Hubble quite a bit, I was still struck by the amount of detailed structure we can see and the increased resolution with the Wide Field Camera 3, as compared to 25 years ago,” Blair said. Wide Field Camera 3 was installed in 2009, the last time Hubble instruments were updated by astronauts.
Blair noted that filaments around the periphery of the nebula appear to have moved more compared to those in the center, and that rather than stretching out over time, they appear to have simply moved outward. This is due to the nature of the Crab as a pulsar wind nebula powered by synchrotron radiation, which is created by the interaction between the pulsar’s magnetic field and the nebula’s material. In other well-known supernova remnants, the expansion is instead driven by shockwaves from the initial explosion, eroding surrounding shells of gas that the dying star previously cast off.
The new, higher-resolution Hubble observations are also providing additional insights into the 3D structure of the Crab Nebula, which can be difficult to determine from a 2D image, Blair said. Shadows of some of the filaments can be seen cast onto the haze of synchrotron radiation in the nebula’s interior. Counterintuitively, some of the brighter filaments in the latest Hubble images show no shadows, indicating they must be located on the far side of the nebula.
According to Blair, the real value of Hubble’s Crab Nebula observations is still to come. The Hubble data can be paired with recent data from other telescopes that are observing the Crab in different wavelengths of light. NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope released its infrared-light observations of the Crab Nebula in 2024. Comparison of the Hubble image with other contemporary multiwavelength observations will help scientists put together a more complete picture of the supernova’s continuing aftermath, centuries after astronomers first wondered at a new little star twinkling in the sky.
The Hubble Space Telescope has been operating for more than three decades and continues to make ground-breaking discoveries that shape our fundamental understanding of the universe. Hubble is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope and mission operations. Lockheed Martin Space, based in Denver, also supports mission operations at NASA Goddard. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, conducts Hubble science operations for NASA.
This 2024 image that NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured of the Crab Nebula, paired with its past observations and those of other telescopes, allows astronomers to study how the supernova remnant is expanding and evolving over time.
Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
This newly processed image of the Crab Nebula comes from data originally captured by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 1999 and 2000.
Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
This 2024 image that NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured of the Crab Nebula, paired with its past observations and those of other telescopes, allows astronomers to study how the supernova remnant is expanding and evolving over time.
Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
This newly processed image of the Crab Nebula comes from data originally captured by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 1999 and 2000.
Image: NASA, ESA, STScI, William Blair (JHU); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)
2024
1999
2024 and 1999
Tracking 25 Years of Expansion
2024 and 1999
Sliding or toggling between these two Hubble images, captured 25 years apart, reveals changes in the position of the nebula’s filaments relative to more distant background stars. Energy from the rapidly spinning pulsar at the nebula’s core is driving the filaments outward. Some differences between the images likely relate to the change in instruments on Hubble. The 1999 image was taken with Hubble’s Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 instrument, which NASA astronauts replaced with the Wide Field Camera 3 in 2009 during Hubble’s last servicing mission. Each instrument took several shots to create a mosaic image of the full nebula. Wide Field Camera 3 has a slightly greater range of detection, both in surface area and filters for imaging.
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Hubble image of the Crab Nebula (2024)
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Crab Nebula (2024)
This 2024 image that NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured of the Crab Nebula, paired with its past observations and those of other telescopes, allows astronomers to study how the supernova remnant is expanding and evolving over time.
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Crab Nebula Expansion over 25 Years
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Wildflower blooms appear as yellow patches at the center of satellite images centered on Carrizo Plain National Monument. The blooms spread and intensify between March 5 and March 13.
NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin
Wildflower blooms appear as yellow patches at the center of satellite images centered on Carrizo Plain National Monument. The blooms spread and intensify between March 5 and March 13.
NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin
March 5, 2026 – March 13, 2026
Golden wildflowers color the Carrizo Plain and surrounding Southern California landscape in these images captured on March 5, 2026 (left), and March 13, 2026 (right), by the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 8 and Landsat 9, respectively.NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin
Whether it qualifies as a “superbloom” is in the eye of the beholder, but there is no doubt that California’s Carrizo Plain and the neighboring mountain ranges were awash with color as wildflowers put on their annual show in spring 2026.
Landsat satellites began to show the early signs of color in February. By early March, flowers had turned areas around Soda Lake a bright shade of yellow, and by mid-month, they had spread even farther. Yellow wildflower blooms are visible amid the dendritic network of streams flanking the alkaline lake, which dries out completely during drought years. Colors were particularly vibrant across the Carrizo Plain National Monument, even decorating meadows along the zipper-shaped San Andreas Fault with splashes of purple due to blooms of Phacelia ciliata.
Wildflowers bloom along the San Andreas Fault in this image acquired on March 13, 2026, by the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 9.
NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin
Winter 2025-2026 brought bouts of rain and variable conditions that benefited wildflowers. Soaking rains saturated soils in November and December, bringing rainfall totals to nearly twice the usual level, according to a report from the California Department of Water Resources. NASA data cited in the report showed soil moisture remained well above average for the month of February.
The pulse of early rains helped kick-start wildflowers because many seeds need at least a half-inch of rain to wash off their protective coating to germinate, according to the National Park Service. The warm, dry periods that followed also helped. Once established, wildflowers benefit from intermittent rainfall rather than constant soaking.
Wildflowers in Carrizo Plain National Monument on March 7, 2026.
Photograph by Erin Berkowitz
The Wild Flower Hotline reported that west-facing slopes of the Temblor Range were the first places to come alive with hillside daisies (Monolopia lanceolata) accompanied by California goldfields (Lasthenia californica) and forked fiddlenecks (Amsinckia furcata) in March. The display in the Caliente Range was enhanced by a lack of grass thatch, which was burned off in the Madre fire in July 2025.
Reports from experts on the ground indicate that common goldfield (Lasthenia gracilis), also called the needle goldfield, is responsible for the expanse of yellow near Soda Lake. Individual plants are small, but they often grow in disturbed areas just centimeters apart and bloom simultaneously, creating expansive blankets of color.
March 5
March 13
A more detailed view shows yellow blooms against a background of green surrounding Soda Lake and several streams to its east.
NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin
A more detailed view shows yellow blooms against a background of green surrounding Soda Lake and several streams to its east.
NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin
March 5, 2026 – March 13, 2026
Common goldfield spreads around California’s Soda Lake in these images acquired on March 5, 2026 (left), and March 13, 2026 (right), by the OLI (Operational Land Imager) on Landsat 8 and Landsat 9, respectively. NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin
In an article for Flora magazine, Bryce King, lead field botanist for the California Native Plant Society, described the Lasthenia blooms there as one of many “seemingly unending stretches of color” across the valley bottom. Lasthenia is a “staple” of vernal pools and seasonally wet areas, he wrote, but the synchronicity of blooms on the valley floor and surrounding hills during a March visit was “beyond anything” he had expected.
Teams of NASA scientists are using remote sensing to study wildflower blooms and flowering plants, aiming to develop techniques for tracking blooms over broad areas and tools that can support farmers, beekeepers, and resource managers. Fruit, nuts, honey, and cotton are among the many crops and commodities produced by flowering plants.
Yoseline Angel captures the spectral signature of goldfield flowers in grasslands near Soda Lake on March 14, 2026, by measuring the reflectance of yellow petals and green leaves with a field spectrometer.
NASA/Andreas Baresch
“I would certainly consider this a superbloom,” said Yoseline Angel, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “It’s hard to describe how stunning these wildflowers were from the ground.”
Angel and Goddard colleague Andres Baresch were in the field in Carrizo Plain National Monument on March 13 taking spectral measurements of blooming wildflowers as Landsat acquired one of the images shown above. They are in the process of developing a global flower monitoring system that will integrate observations from the ground with those from space-based sensors such as OLI on Landsat 8 and 9 and EMIT (Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation) on the International Space Station to track the progression of blooms.
“This was the perfect opportunity to test how well our models scale between the ground and satellites,” she said. “We were fortunate to have a huge number of seeds germinate and bloom simultaneously because last year was so dry and this winter was so wet.”
Gold and purple wildflowers bloom in Carrizo Plain National Monument on March 7, 2026.
Photograph by Erin Berkowitz
NASA Earth Observatory images by Lauren Dauphin, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey.Photos courtesy of Erin Berkowitz and Andres Baresch. Story by Adam Voiland.
