You might not believe it, but this picture is a real photo, not photoshopped and not some sort of artist’s rendition. This is a photograph of Saturn and its rings with the Sun behind it and was taken by NASA’s Cassini Spacecraft in 2006.

This was featured as NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day earlier this week, with the following interesting info about the scientific importance of the picture:

Saturn’s rings light up so much that new rings were discovered, although they are hard to see in the image. Seen in spectacular detail, however, is Saturn’s E ring, the ring created by the newly discovered ice-fountains of the moon Enceladus and the outermost ring visible above. Far in the distance, at the left, just above the bright main rings, is the almost ignorable pale blue dot of Earth.

Click to see the full-size version (It would make a fantastic desktop wallpaper).