On November 1, 2016, NASA’s Aqua satellite passed over Indonesia, allowing the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on board to capture a stunning true-color image of oceanic nonlinear internal solitary waves from the Lombok Strait. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/image11052016_250m.jpg

An astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) used a long lens to document what crews have termed one of the most spectacular features of the planet: the dunes of the Namib Sand Sea. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/iss047e023405_lrg.jpg

Many Martian landscapes contain features that are familiar to ones we find on Earth, like river valleys, cliffs, glaciers and volcanos. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia21216.jpg

Expedition 50 Commander Shane Kimbrough of NASA shared this photograph of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Kounotori H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV-6) as it approached the International Space Station. Kimbrough and Flight Engineer Thomas Pesquet successfully captured the spacecraft using the station's Canadarm2 robotic arm. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/czj8bxlw8aapi4b.jpg

The foreground of this scene from the Mast Camera (Mastcam) on NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows purple-hued rocks near the rover's late-2016 location on lower Mount Sharp. The scene's middle distance includes higher layers that are future destinations for the mission. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia21256_sol1516mrseq07719-nolabels.jpg

Hurricane forecasters will soon have a new tool to better understand and forecast storm intensity. A constellation of eight microsatellites, called NASA’s Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System mission, or CYGNSS, got a boost into Earth orbit aboard an Orbital ATK Pegasus XL rocket, deployed from an L-1011 aircraft. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/g0043192.jpg

Spiral galaxy IC 5201 sits 40 million light-years from us in the Crane constellation. As with most spirals we see, it has a bar of stars slicing through its center. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/potw1650a.jpg

Although there are no seasons in space, this cosmic vista invokes thoughts of a frosty winter landscape. It is, in fact, a region called NGC 6357 where radiation from hot, young stars is energizing the cooler gas in the cloud that surrounds them. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/ngc6357.jpg

This composite image, made from ten frames, shows the International Space Station, with a crew of six onboard, in silhouette as it transits the sun at roughly five miles per second, Saturday, Dec. 17, 2016, from Newbury Park, California. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/30903636564_0127bfba48_o.jpg

This week in 1968, Apollo 8, the first crewed Apollo mission, launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Dec. 21, 1968. Here, the S-IC stage is being erected for final assembly of the Saturn V launch vehicle in Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/6761894-orig.jpg

This week in 1968, Apollo 8, the first crewed Saturn V launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center on Dec. 21, 1968. Here, the S-IC stage is being erected for final assembly of the Saturn V launch vehicle in Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/6761894-orig.jpg

This image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft is one of the highest-resolution views ever taken of Saturn's moon Pandora. Pandora (84 kilometers, or 52 miles across) orbits Saturn just outside the narrow F ring. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia21055-1041.jpg

Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 50 Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson of NASA sent holiday greetings and festive imagery from the cupola on Dec. 18. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/iss050e017211.jpg

Just hours after the winter solstice, a mass of energetic particles from the Sun smashed into the magnetic field around Earth. The strong solar wind stream stirred up a display of northern lights over northern Canada. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/aurora_vir_2016357_lrg.jpg

Sunlight truly has come to Saturn's north pole. The whole northern region is bathed in sunlight in this view from late 2016, feeble though the light may be at Saturn's distant domain in the solar system. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia20513_0.jpg

This galaxy acts as an astronomical laser, beaming out microwave emission rather than visible light. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/potw1652a.jpg

A satellite is ejected from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Small Satellite Orbital Deployer on the International Space Station on Dec. 19, 2016. The satellite is actually two small satellites that, once at a safe distance from the station, separated from each other, but were still connected by a 100-meter-long Kevlar tether. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/iss050e017076.jpg

Floating high above the hydrocarbon lakes, wispy clouds have finally started to return to Titan's northern latitudes. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia20516-1041.jpg

Impact craters expose the subsurface materials on the steep slopes of Mars. However, these slopes often experience rockfalls and debris avalanches that keep the surface clean of dust, revealing a variety of hues, like in this enhanced-color image from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, representing different rock types. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/pia14454.jpg

Astronomers have discovered what happens when the eruption from a supermassive black hole is swept up by the collision and merger of two galaxy clusters. http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/thumbnails/image/a3411.jpg