After a couple of gloomy posts about the poor hedgehogs, I thought I should feature something wonderful and lovely and spirits-raising. And so … here’s a mention of one of my favourite websites to brighten things up: NASA’s APOD site, otherwise known as the Astronomy Picture of the Day.

It pretty much does what it says on the tin: every day it features a wonderful photo to do with the skies above us. Sometimes they are Hubble space telescope shots, sometimes they are photos by the legion of talented amateur photographers who photograph our skies by both day and night, sometimes they are photos taken from the International Space Station; whatever the source they are invariably beautiful shots that fill me with wonder and joy.

M16: Pillars of Creation. Pillars of evaporating gaseous globules emerging from pillars of molecular hydrogen gas and dust in the Eagle Nebula, which is associated with the open star cluster M16. Photo by J Hester and P Scowen.

I am completely unscientifically-minded, but I love learning about the natural world about us, whether it is the worlds beyond our planet, or the geology and meteorology of our own. NASA has some fantastic websites, and this is one of my favourites. Click on the links in the text written by professional astronomers that accompanies the photos, and have a truffle round in the archive (link at the bottom of the APOD page)—you’ll lose hours but you’ll learn so much!

The Milky Way, photographed at Bryce Canyon, Utah, USA. Photo by Wally Pacholka.

Sun with solar flare. 13 April 2013. Photo by NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory.

Crossing Dingo Gap on Mars, taken by the wonderful Curiosity Rover near Mt Sharp on Mars.