One of my favorite deep space gems, the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex, rests at the end of a dark finger of intergallactic dust. On the other side of the dust trail, near the core of the Milky Way, the planet Jupiter glows brightly surrounded by a rainbow corona. Though I've many times seen coronae around the sun or moon, this is the first time I've seen it around a planet. The colorful ring is caused by fine ice particles in the atmosphere. This springtime scene was captured in the inland hills of Northern California.