NASA - Picture Dictionary

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Picture Dictionary

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

A is for...

Red, blue and green dyes flow over a white plastic model of an airplane inside a water tunnel

Two men sit at computers while testing an airplane in the background

A drawing of an airplane with the ailerons highlighted in red

An aircraft with three tail fins and wings that arch upward flies through the sky

An astronaut can be seen in the open airlock of the International Space Station as he gets ready to close the hatch

A man standing in an icy location releases a large weather balloon

This picture of a rocky asteroid is a combination of high-resolution color information from a NASA spacecraft

Astronaut Barbara Morgan poses in a training version of a spacesuit

Cartoon of Dr. Marc Rayman looking through a telescope

A desert sky is lit by a meteor shower

Layers of the upper atmosphere looked at from the edge, shown in colors ranging from red near the earth to blue towards space

A large, white airplane flies near mountains in Vail, Colo.

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B is for...

Gary Stutte holds a tray with green, leafy sprouts on it

A long, white solid rocket booster burns as the space shuttle launches into orbit

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C is for...

A small white jet sits on a runway with two astronauts in its seats and the two canopies opened

Photo of the Grand Canyon

Ship's crew moving an Apollo capsule out of the water to the ship's deck

An astronaut moving large, white cargo containers around in the International Space Station

Chandra with Earth in the background

Chandra X-ray
Observatory

Drawing of a simple circuit with wire in a rectangle shape that includes a switch, battery and light bulb

Tia Ferguson in a red coat with a furry hood in Antarctica

A cloud, flat on the bottom, with a very tall, large top that is shaped like a mountain

A female astronaut sits in the cockpit of a small jet

A true-color image of Comet NEAT

Colorful drawing of the North American continent

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D is for...

A space shuttle docked to the ISS

The docking port juts out from the ISS

A shuttle is shown landing with an open drag chute trailing from the back

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E is for...

City lights on Earth glowing at night

A picture showing the electromagnetic spectrum from radio waves to gamma waves

Electromagnetic Spectrum

Diagram of an elliptical orbit

An astronaut in an orange launch and entry suit practices going down a crew escape slide

Emergency Egress

Picture of lighthouse giving off light against a dark sky with the moon in the background

A NASA engineer poses with a robot in the snow

With a blue ocean and sky as the backdrop, smoke and steam surround the launch pad as a spacecraft lifts off

Escape Velocity

A space shuttle, surrounded by billowing white clouds of smoke, launches into the air

Wearing a short-sleeved shirt and shorts, an astronaut puts his hand in a glovebox

Artist's concept of future moon exploration

An astronaut dressed in a large, bulky spacesuit waves to the camera while working in space

Extravehicular Mobility Unit

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F is for...

A large metal structure on top of concrete

Orange liquid is poured into a clear glass container

Drawing of a boy pushing a cart

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G is for...

This artist's concept illustrates the new view of the Milky Way

A black circle with the letter E, representing empty, printed on the left and the letter F, representing full, printed on the right, and a red arrow pointing toward the E

Artist's concept of a human exploring the surface of Mars

Glacier Grey, Chile

Historic photo of the Wrights’ third test glider being launched, with one man aboard and one to each side of the glider

A drawing of a glovebox

An astronaut smiles as two grapefruit float in front of him

Close-up of a gyroscope toy

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H is for...

Artist's concept of a moon habitat

An orbiter sits inside a large hangar

A picture of the Hubble Space Telescope with Earth in the background

Hubble Space Telescope

The X-43A launches from a modified Pegasus booster rocket

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I is for...

A crater on Earth's moon

The International Space Station in space with Earth in the background

International Space Station

A man wearing a white coat and blue gloves works on his invention

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J is for...

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K is for...

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L is for...

A man and a woman set up a microphone before testing the noise levels of a machine

Against a black night sky, the space shuttle Discovery and its seven-member crew head toward Earth orbit

Steven Swanson completes a spacewalk outside the International Space Station while wearing a spacesuit

Life Support System

A drawing of an airplane in flight with the wings outlined in yellow

A reddish-orange picture of our moon during a total lunar eclipse

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M is for...

Two men use a machine to fix a robot

A horseshoe magnet with the letter N on one end and the letter S on the other

A cartoon showing a newscaster looking at a dog stuck in a pond in the middle of a field with trees

A small black meteorite lies in the snow while a man dressed in black and red winter clothing documents where it was found

Three educator astronauts in blue flight suits floating in an airplane

John Glenn gets into the Friendship 7 capsule

Photograph of a hand holding a small scale model of the Galileo spacecraft

Destiny laboratory module

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N is for...

Two astronauts wearing white suits float in a large tank of water

Neutral Buoyancy

Against a dark blue sky, exhaust shoots out of the nozzle of a solid rocket booster during a shuttle launch

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O is for...

The International Space Station, with the blackness of space beyond Earth's horizon in the background

A space shuttle orbiter landing on the hard surface at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida

An artist's drawing of a Mars outpost

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P is for...

A space shuttle's payload bay can be seen through open doors

A set of photographs, taken by NASA spacecraft, of the eight planets and Earth’s moon

This drawing shows Titan's surface with Saturn in the background. The Cassini spacecraft flies overhead with its antenna pointed at Huygens as the probe nears the surface.

The X-15 launches with its rocket engine ignited

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Q is for...

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R is for...

An illustration of a space shuttle, with its payload doors open, sending and receiving radar signals

A cartoon character stands in a field looking at a rainbow

Assorted bags of snack food and dehydrated food

Drawing showing an airplane and satellite in the sky bouncing signals to Earth

A person with protective yellow gloves and white lab clothes, including mask and head covering, looks into a microscope

A human-like robot holds a caution sign

An astronaut is anchored to a foot restraint on the International Space Station's Canadarm2, against the blackness of space and Earth's horizon

Clouds of exhaust form around a rocket as it launches

A round blue patch showing the space station, names of astronauts, six stars and the numerals XX

Flash animation of Earth rotating

An artist's drawing of one of NASA’s Mars rover on the surface of Mars

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S is for...

The Aqua satellite constellation consists of the Aqua, CloudSat, CALIPSO, PARASOL and Aura satellites

The words Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter are superimposed on a colorful background

Two pilots sit at the controls of an airplane simulator

The sun is shown as a huge, glowing ball of gas

A view of the International Space Station's solar arrays

A bright ring of light peeks out from behind the moon as it moves in front of the sun during an eclipse

The use of an ultraviolet filter created this green image of the sun

Workers put a solar panel onto NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft

Illustration of the solar system from the Solar Exploration Web site

Clouds of exhaust form around a rocket as it launches

A woman holds an American flag while standing at the South Pole

South Pole /
North Pole

A Russian Soyuz spacecraft leaving the ISS

Artist's concept of a giant planet in space with a red dwarf star beyond it

Words superimposed on this image of a space shuttle

The International Space Station in space with Earth in the background

Astronaut Patrick Forrester poses for a picture in a white spacesuit

Astronaut floating in space with Earth in the background

Ares 1 separated into parts

Delta II rocket's second stage

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T is for...

A boy looks through a telescope

A man standing near a plane in the salt flats looking at a plane flying in the sky

Belly of the space shuttle set against a black sky

Thermal Protection System

A drawing of a jet flying across a desert, with arrows pointing away from the rear of the jet

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U is for...

A jumble of galaxies including a yellow spiral galaxy, a young blue galaxy and several smaller red galaxies

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V is for...

Red smoke swirling behind the wings of an aircraft as it leaves the ground

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W is for....

Wavelength diagram showing a blue line going up and down and then up again

A girl lying in the snow making a snow angel

Cartoon airplane flying in a cloudy sky with red arrows pointing down with the word WEIGHT on each of them

A drawing of a fan blowing yellow strips of paper across a helicopter inside a wind tunnel

Photo of a group of men and women

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X is for...

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Y is for...

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Z is for...

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