Astronomy Picture of the Day

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.

2016 April 22

NGC 7635: The Bubble Nebula
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble Heritage Team (STScI / AURA)

Explanation: Blown by the wind from a massive star, this interstellar apparition has a surprisingly familiar shape. Cataloged as NGC 7635, it is also known simply as The Bubble Nebula. Although it looks delicate, the 7 light-year diameter bubble offers evidence of violent processes at work. Above and left of the Bubble’s center is a hot, O-type star, several hundred thousand times more luminous and around 45 times more massive than the Sun. A fierce stellar wind and intense radiation from that star has blasted out the structure of glowing gas against denser material in a surrounding molecular cloud. The intriguing Bubble Nebula and associated cloud complex lie a mere 7,100 light-years away toward the boastful constellation Cassiopeia. This sharp, tantalizing view of the cosmic bubble is a composite of Hubble Space Telescope image data from 2016, released to celebrate the 26th anniversary of Hubble’s launch.

Smallest full moon of 2016 on April 22

Tonight – April 22, 2016 – it’s the farthest full moon, and smallest full moon, of the year. We’ve heard it called the micro-moon or mini-moon. This full moon comes less than one day after reaching lunar apogee, the moon’s farthest point in its monthly orbit. It lies some 30 thousand miles (50 thousand km) farther from Earth than 2016’s closest full moon – a supermoon – due on November 14.

Every year has a closest full moon, and a farthest full moon. The mini-moon often returns about one month and 18 days later with each passing year, meaning that, in 2017, the year’s smallest full moon will come on June 9.

In 2018, the year’s smallest full moon will fall on July 27; and in 2019, the smallest full moon will occur on September 14. The micro-moon or mini-moon frequently recurs in periods of 14 lunar months (14 returns to full moon).

The crest of the moon’s full phase comes on April 22, 2016 at precisely 5:24 Universal Time.

Although the full moon occurs at the same instant all around the world, our clocks read differently in various time zones. In the United States, the moon turns exactly full on April 22, at 1:24 a.m. EDT, 12:24 a.m. CDT, and on April 21 at 11:24 p.m. MDT and 10:24 p.m. PST.

So in the Americas, the full moon happens on the night of April 21-22, and may have already passed by the time you are reading this post.

Meanwhile, your calendar probably says that April 22 is the full moon.

No matter where you live worldwide, look for the moon to look plenty full on the night of April 22. As with any moon near the vicinity of full moon, it’ll light up the nighttime from early evening until dawn.

In North America, we often call the April full moon by the names of Pink Moon, Grass Moon, Egg Moon or Fish Moon.

But in recent years, we’ve also heard the term micro-moon to describe the year’s smallest full moon. It’s not a name (like Pink Moon) tied to skylore. It’s not bound to a particular month or season.

It’s just a modern term to describe the year’s smallest moon.

Like most astronomers, we at EarthSky used to call the year’s smallest full moon an apogee full moon.

The terms mini-moon and micro-moon stem from popular culture. They roll off the tongue more easily than apogee full moon. As some indication of the appellation’s growing popularity, we’ve found that the NASA Astronomy Photo of the Day and timeanddate.org sites both like to call the year’s smallest full moon a micro-moon.

In many respects, the micro-moon is the antithesis of a supermoon. The micro-moon, or the full moon aligning with apogee, is the polar opposite of a full moon supermoon, the full moon coinciding with perigee.

Every month for the next seven months, the full moon will come closer and closer to Earth until the November 14 supermoon, closest full moon of the year.

That November full moon will be the year’s biggest and brightest moon, only 221,524 miles (356,509 km) away. That’s in contrast to the moon’s mean distance from Earth of about 384,400 kilometers (238,855 miles).

In fact, the November 14, 2016, supermoon will be closer to Earth than the moon has been thus far in the 21st century (2001-2100). The moon won’t come so close again until the full moon of November 25, 2034.

But it’s the December, 2052, full moon that’ll outdo them all. It’ll stage the closest and largest supermoon of the 21st century (2001 to 2100).

Bottom line: The micro-moon or mini-moon – smallest full moon of 2016 – comes on April 22. It lies about 30,000 miles (50,000 km) farther away from Earth than the full moon supermoon of November 14, 2016.

Author

Bruce McClure

Bruce McClure is the chief writer for the popular EarthSky Tonight pages. Since joining EarthSky in 2004, he has written thousands of astronomy articles, enjoyed here by millions. He also writes, gives planetarium shows and hosts a wide assortment of public astronomy programs in and around his home in upstate New York. If you ask an astronomy question on our site, it’s likely to be Bruce that answers it. His love for the heavens has taken him to Lake Titicaca in Bolivia, and he has sailed the North Atlantic, earning his celestial navigation certificate through the School of Ocean Sailing and Navigation. Bruce is also a sundial aficionado. He says his number one passion – besides his wife Alice – is stargazing.

Article published on EarthSky

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