Images

The biologically complex conditions of mangroves are shown in dark green along the fingers of the Ord River in Australia. Yellow, orange, and blue represent the impressive flow patterns of sediment and nutrients in this tropical estuary. The bright spot at the lower left is an area of mudflats, which is home to saltwater crocodiles.

Like scratches on a marble table, airplane contrails cut across the southern California Mojave Desert. The shadows from the contrails cast dark lines across the ground. Contrails form when cold, dry air mixes with warmer aircraft exhaust.

The Green River and the Colorado River meet within Canyonlands National Park in Utah. Snow-covered Mount Waas, shown in light blue on the right side of the image, overlooks the arches, canyons, and bizarre rock formations that prevail throughout this region.

Lake Manicouagan, Canada, is one of the Earth's largest and oldest known impact craters. The crater is 65 kilometers (40 miles) wide and is estimated to be about 214 million years old. The lake and island are clearly seen from space and are sometimes called the "Eye of Quebec."

A mesmerizing plume creates a paradox of light and dark, brilliant and murky. The dark water of the Suwannee River flows from the Okefenokee Swamp in southern Georgia to the Gulf of America in Florida. The river’s inky color comes from decaying vegetation at the river’s swampy source.

The tendency to recognize human faces in things that are not human is common. Can you see the eye, nose, and mouth in this satellite image of Morocco? The face captured in this "Earth Selfie" appears to be quietly watching over the waters just off its coast. The city of Agadir is underneath the chin, and the irrigated farms of the Souss Valley appear in red.

This ASTER image of the Sheveluch volcano covered in ash atop the snow cover of winter on Russia's Kamchatka peninsula was captured in 2014 after recent eruptions. ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) is an instrument, resulting from a U.S. and Japanese partnership, that is aboard NASA's Terra satellite.

A 2014 ASTER image of Baektu Mountain, an active volcano on the border between North Korea and China. The crater lake at the summit is called Heaven Lake. ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) is an instrument, resulting from a U.S. and Japanese partnership, that is aboard NASA's Terra satellite.

Within the Hamersley Iron Province in Western Australia, Landsat's shortwave infrared and near-infrared detectors highlight different types of rock. The oval in the upper center part of the image is a geological feature called Rocklea Dome. The dark meanders within the dome are channel iron deposits.

This enhanced image of Western Australia resembles a mixture of crayons that melted in the sun. The yellow sand dunes of the Great Sandy Desert cover the upper right portion of the image. Red splotches indicate burned areas from grass and forest fires, and the colors in the rest of the image depict different types of surface geology.

The patterns and colors in the Zagros Mountains of Iran are interesting enough. For example, the infrared view provides a patina-like outline to the mountains. But something more happened to this unique landscape. Interrupting the mountain patterns are irregular dark patches called salt glaciers.

Slessor Glacier in Antarctica flows between the angular promontory Parry Point on the top left of the image and the Shackleton Range on the lower right. The purple highlights are exposed ice. Strong winds blow away the snow cover and expose lines that indicate the glacier flow direction. Rock outcrops next to the glacier also exhibit some of this bare ice.

This Landsat 8 image of central Ethiopia, acquired January 1, 2014, uses the shortwave infrared, near infrared, and red spectral bands (bands 6,5,4) to emphasize vegetation and land cover. In this combination, healthy vegetation appears bright green.

Is this a tiny creature on a microscope slide? No, but you are close. This is an image of a structure built by a multitude of small creatures. At about 21 kilometers (13 miles) wide, this feature is the largest coral structure in the southern Gulf of America.

No water. No vegetation. No oases. Known as the "Land of Terror," the Tanezrouft Basin in Algeria is one of the most desolate parts of the Sahara Desert. Sand dunes, which appear in yellow, streak down the left side of the image, and sandstone formations carved by relentless wind erosion make concentric loops, much like the grain seen in a piece of wood.

What appear to be smatterings of paint on a wall represent an amalgam of human-made and natural features in southwestern Iran. The dark red shape in the center of the image is Shadegan Pond, which is the northern part of the larger Shadegan Wetlands.

In southern Malawi, the erosion-resistant rock of Mulanje Massif, a large mountain mass, rises dramatically above the landscape near Lake Chilwa, a shallow, saline lake. The upper slopes of the massif are protected forest. The deep green color south of the massif is tea and macadamia farms.

What looks like lightning arcing through an ominous cloud is actually a dry landscape of rocky buttes in southern Utah and northeastern Arizona. River channels flow north from Arizona into the San Juan River. The light vertical feature at the top of the image is referred to as Comb Ridge, a jagged fold in the Earth's crust called a monocline.

The Beni River in Bolivia resembles a blue ribbon as it meanders toward the Amazon River. Scattered along the river are numerous oxbow lakes, which are curved bodies of water that form when a meander from the main stem of a river is cut off, creating a freestanding body of water.

These green and blue swirls in the Bering Sea reveal the bottom of the food chain in the ocean. Microscopic organisms called phytoplankton, which are important to fish populations, may be too small to be seen individually, but in vast numbers they are visible from space. The white clouds in the image look like bubbles in an aquarium.

Coral growth offshore of the Hawaiian Island of Kahoʻolawe has been significantly impacted by the island's deforestation and resulting erosion and sediment run-off into the nearshore environment. This image is of a coral reef in deeper waters offshore of Kahoʻolawe.