Magnificent Photo of Comet Lovejoy

The world's most powerful camera has taken a spectacular photo, or rather photographs, of Comet Lovejoy.

These images were actually taken by mistake. On December 27, 2014, Comet Lovejoy was 82 million kilometers away. At the time, the 570MP Dark Energy Camera was observing a specific area to gather information about dark energy over a five-year period. The reason for the accidental images was that the comet was moving within the observation area.

The amazing camera took multiple pictures, and when scientists combined them, they got this image. Isn't it impressive?

Since the original image is 3.5 MB, a smaller version is available below. To see the original and higher quality version, click here. Comet Lovejoy.

The 570MP Dark Energy Camera in Chile took these photos on December 27, 2014.
Credit: Fermilab's Marty Murphy, Nikolay Kuropatkin, Huan Lin and Brian Yanny