Sources

"John Frederick William Herschel." Science and Its Times. Ed. Neil Schlager and Josh Lauer. Vol. 5: 1800 to 1899. Detroit: Gale, 2000. 496. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 18 Dec. 2014.

"Herschel, John." Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 2008, and John Cannon. "Herschel, John." Encyclopedia.com. HighBeam Research, 01 Jan. 2008. Web. 18 Dec. 2014.

"John Herschel." John Herschel. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Dec. 2014.

"John Frederick William Herschel - Biography." John Frederick William Herschel. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Dec. 2014.

APOD 2.6

As if the Aurora Borealis wasn't beautiful enough, taken through a long exposure shot over a pretty lake really adds to the sheer beauty, along with giving a glow to the entire area around it. But to further capitalize on it, the long exposure ended up capturing a Geminid Meteor, fireball specifically, go streaking across the sky. Tearing through the Big Dipper gave off a stunning and dramatic shot. Amazing what 30 seconds of exposure, charged particles in the magnetosphere, and absolute perfect timing can do and create.

APOD 2.5

Yet another wonder of the night sky, Eta Carinae is an expanding nebula formed by unknown forces from its star system form. This Homunculus Nebula is a complete mystery of formation, but also is a beautiful wonder as over the past 170 years it has grown brighter, faded, brighter again, etc. in 1995 it actually became the second brightest star system in the sky.  Shown over three pictures is it actually not only brightening and dimming, but also it having amazing streams of light shooting out amongst the gas clouds that are expanding from the central massive star. Still exploding randomly even now, it is expected that this system will eventually cause an amazing supernova. Eventually.