Gorgeous galaxies and stunning stars make up this selection of pictures from the shortlisted entries for this year’s Insight Astronomy Photographer of the Year award. The winners will be announced on 15 September, and an exhibition of the winning images will be will be displayed in a free exhibition at the Royal Observatory Greenwich’s Astronomy Centre from 17 September. Here: “Seven Magic Points”. The rusty red swirls of the circular, iron sculpture Seven Magic Points in Brattebergan, Norway mirror the rippling aurora above. (Photo by Rune Engebø/Royal Observatory Greenwich’s Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2016/National Maritime Museum)

Undulatus asperatus (or alternately, asperatus) is a cloud formation, proposed in 2009 as a separate cloud classification by the founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society. If successful it will be the first cloud formation added since cirrus intortus in 1951 to the International Cloud Atlas of the World Meteorological Organization. The name translates approximately as “roughened or agitated waves”.

Commended. In late May, about a quarter of a million snow geese arrive from North America to nest on Wrangel Island, in northeastern Russia. They form the world's largest breeding colony of snow geese. Photographer Sergey Gorshkov spent two months on the remote island photographing the unfolding dramas. Arctic foxes take advantage of the abundance of eggs, caching surplus eggs for leaner times. But a goose (here the gander) is easily a match for a fox, which must rely on speed and guile to steal eggs. “The battles were fairly equal”, notes Sergey, “and I only saw a fox succeed in grabbing an egg on a couple of occasions, despite many attempts”. Surprisingly, “the geese lacked any sense of community spirit”, he adds, “and never reacted when a fox harassed a neighboring pair nesting close by”. (Photo by Sergey Gorshkov/Veolia Environnement Wildlife Photographer)

Cory Ritz braces himself as a wave bursts onto a pier at the Boynton Beach inlet on August 25, 2011 in Boynton Beach, Florida. Hurricane Irene is moving over the Bahamas and could still be a major storm as it approaches the North Carolina coast the morning of August 27. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Blindfolded Myanmar boys try to eat the biscuits during a fair on the occasion of the 73rd Myanmar Independence Day in Yangon, Myanmar, 04 January 2021. Myanmar, also known as Burma, was colonized by Britain in 1824 and became an independent republic on 04 January 1948. (Photo by Lynn Bo Bo/EPA/EFE)

People in face masks cross a near-empty street after the government announced a state of emergency for the capital and some prefectures following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Tokyo, Japan on April 16, 2020. (Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)

A man and a woman jump over a bonfire during Ivan Kupala Day celebrations held by the Belarusian State Museum of Folk Architecture and Rural Lifestyle in the village of Ozertso near Minsk, Belarus on July 4, 2020. Ivan Kupala Day, also known as Ivana-Kupala or Kupala Night, is a traditional pagan holiday celebrated in eastern Slavic cultures. Various rituals are traditionally performed on Kupala Night, including making flower wreaths, fortune-telling, jumping over bonfires, and burning a wheel-like effigy symbolizing the sun. (Photo by Natalia Fedosenko/TASS)

Boys contort their faces as they participate in a game where they need to slide a coin from their forehead to their mouth to win, during the annual Feast Day of St. Rita of Cascia in Manila, Philippines on May 19, 2019. (Photo by Noel Celis/AFP Photo)