SDO: The Moon Gets in My Way

By Nancy Atkinson - May 3, 2011 at 6:47 PM UTC | Solar Astronomy

Early today, the Solar Dynamics Observatory was able to observe the Moon coming in between the spacecraft and the Sun. If you look closely, you can actually see mountains on the Moon subtly backlit by the Sun's atmosphere.

Cool!

The SDO science team says that not only is this amazing to see, but it actually allows them to "sharpen-up" the SDO images. The sharp edge of the lunar limb allows our team to measure the in-orbit characteristics of the telescopes on board the spacecraft.

See a close-up image (processed by our own Jason Major) below.

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Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com