TIME Science Space

Watch Stunning Timelapse Imagery of Earth’s Surface From the International Space Station

Sam Frizell

Jan. 2, 2015

From cities at night to Auroras and sunrises, the surface of the earth is as beautiful as you might imagine

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In the six months astronaut Alexander Gerst spent at the International Space Station, he captured an incredible compendium of images of Earth in ultra high definition. The sunrises, clouds, stars, oceans, the Milky Way, and the fragile web of cities lighted at night are collected here in a series of time-lapses.

And perhaps because Gerst is a native of techno-loving Germany, the spectacular video is accompanied by a tasteful soundtrack of spacey house music.

Gerst ended his six-month Blue Dot mission in November.

See the Most Beautiful Space Photos of 2014

NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array's first picture of the sun taken in high-energy X-rays released on Dec. 22, 2014.

An infrared image of a small portion of the Monkey Head Nebula (also known as NGC 2174 and Sharpless Sh2-252) captured by the Hubble telescope, released on March 17, 2014. The nebula is a star-forming region that hosts dusky dust clouds silhouetted against glowing gas.NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

A spiral galaxy, also known as M106, about 23 million light years from Earth.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/nasamarshall/15050207206/Eta Carinae: Our Neighboring Superstars (NASA, Chandra, 08/26/14)Eta Carinae is one of the most luminous known star systems in our galaxy. It radiates energy at a rate that is 5 million times that of the Sun. Most of this energy is radiated at infrared wavelengths. It is shrouded in a rapidly expanding cloud of dust which absorbs radiation from the central star and re-radiates it in the infrared.

A reprocessed picture shows off the amazing colors of Europa, a mysterious ice-covered moon of Jupiter, as they have never been seen before released on Nov. 21, 2014.

Reid Wiseman ‏@astro_reid Jun 1A simple toy from my childhood makes for a cool picture in space. pic.twitter.com/yddfNTwiow

Infrared Image of Saturn's Rings

ESA's Optical Ground Station in Tenerife

An aurora near Australia seen from the International SPace Station, released on July 15, 2014.

NASA: LL Ori and the Orion Nebula

The Eagle Nebula, also known as as Messier 16 or M16, and the 'Pillars of Creation' in the constellation Serpens in May 2014.

Russell Crater dunes on Mars released on Feb. 5, 2014.

NASA image of Saturn taken with the Cassini spacecraft wide-angle camera

This vista of the Endeavour Crater rim taken by Opportunity Rover combines several exposures taken by the rover's panoramic camera (Pancam) on the 3,637th Martian day, or sol, of the mission on April 18, 2014 and was released on May 19, 2014.

Alexander Gerst ‏@Astro_Alex Jul 6 View translationHarsh land. Windswept valleys in northern #Africa / Hartes Land. Windgefraeste Taeler in Nordafrika pic.twitter.com/sFcbhRIF2Z

The moon over northeast Greenland in March 2014.

NASA picture of a crescent moon rising over the cusp of the Earth's atmosphere

An optical image, from the Digitized Sky Survey of the Flame Nebula released on May 7, 2014.

New Hubble infrared view of the Tarantula Nebula

The sun emitted a significant solar flare, peaking at 7:28 p.m. EST on Dec. 19, 2014. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, which watches the sun constantly, captured an image of the event. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however -- when intense enough -- they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel. This flare is classified as an X1.8-class flare. X-class denotes the most intense flares, while the number provides more information about its strength. An X2 is twice as intense as an X1, an X3 is three times as intense, etc.

The Elephant's Trunk Nebula, also known as IC 1396, on April 14, 2014.

As an island in the moist, atmospherically turbulent North Atlantic, Iceland is often shrouded in cloud cover and hard to observe from space. And lately, the island is making some of its own cloud cover, as the Earth has split open between the Bardarbunga and Askja volcanoes and spewed lava and hot gas. The view of the Holuhraun lava field has been spectacular from the ground and from low-flying aircraft. Infrared imaging makes the view spectacular from space, too.On September 6, 2014, the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 captured this view of the ongoing eruption. The false-color images combine shortwave infrared, near infrared, and green light (OLI bands 6-5-3). Ice and the plume of steam and sulfur dioxide appear cyan and bright blue, while liquid water is navy blue. Bare or rocky ground around the Holuhraun lava field appears in shades of green or brown in this band combination. Fresh lava is bright orange and red. (Download this large image to see the same area in natural color.)“Thermal imagery can be used to determine the extent of the lava flows and the heat loss,” noted Ashley Davies, a Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist and leader of NASA’s Volcano Sensor Web team. Infrared imagery can help scientists estimate the effusion rate—the rate at which lava is pouring out of the Earth—as well as the sulfur dioxide content of the plume. “And high resolution imagery of this kind allows us to model the dynamics of the emplacement process. In this case, individual vents can be seen feeding separate lava flows that combine into a main channel feeding an expanding lava flow field.”By some accounts, Holuhraun has spewed more lava this month than any Icelandic volcano since the 19th century. As of September 9, 2014, the new lava flow was 16 kilometers (10 miles) long and covered about 20 square kilometers (8 square miles), according to the University of Iceland.The plume from Holuhraun is rich with sulfur dioxide (SO2), a rotten-smelling gas

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APTOPIX Kazakhstan Russia Space Station

Using the CIVA camera on Rosetta’s Philae lander the spacecraft snapped a ‘selfie’ with a comet passing by in the background in this photo released on Oct. 14, 2014.

Saturn, which appears as a thin crescent, broken only by the shadows of its rings, was captured by the Cassini spacecraft cameras in this image released on March 17, 2014. This view looks toward the unilluminated side of the rings from about 42 degrees below the ringplane.

Handout of the evolving universe is shown in this composite of separate exposures taken in 2003 to 2012 with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3

Reid Wiseman ‏@astro_reid Jul 1Here is a #TodaySunrise from space for @MLauer pic.twitter.com/xyckQ0AAdVHere is a #TodaySunrise from space for @MLauer.