An impressive arc shaped rim of HII structure located in Scorpius tail and known as the Prawn Nebula. The center portion of the nebula is very bright and it seems there is a faint reflection component embedding it. Bright stars are part of Open Cluster named Trumpler 24 which shines at magnitude 8.6 and spans over 60 arc minutes representing approximately 250 light years across.
Stunning emission nebula IC 1396 mixes glowing cosmic gas and dark dust clouds in the high and far off constellation of Cepheus.
Energized by the bright, bluish central star seen here, this star forming region sprawls across hundreds of light-years — spanning over three degrees on the sky while nearly 3,000 light-years from planet Earth. Among the intriguing dark shapes within IC 1396, the winding Elephant’s Trunk nebula lies just below center.
The gorgeous color view is a composition of digitized black and white photographic plates recorded through red and blue astronomical filters. The plates were taken using the Samuel Oschin Telescope, a wide-field survey instrument at Palomar Observatory, between 1989 and 1993.
Image Credit: Digitized Sky Survey, ESA/ESO/NASA FITS Liberator Color Composite: Davide De Martin
Beautiful emission nebula NGC 6164 was created by a rare, hot, luminous O-type star, some 40 times as massive as the Sun. Seen at the center of the cosmic cloud, the star is a mere 3 to 4 million years old. In another three to four million years the massive star will end its life in a supernova explosion. Spanning around 4 light-years, the nebula itself has a bipolar symmetry. That makes it similar in appearance to more familiar planetary nebulae - the gaseous shrouds surrounding dying sun-like stars. Also like many planetary nebulae, NGC 6164 has been found to have an extensive, faint halo, revealed in this deep telescopic image of the region. Expanding into the surrounding interstellar medium, the material in the halo is likely from an earlier active phase of the O star. The gorgeous skyscape is a composite of narrow-band image data highlighting the glowing gas, and broad-band data of the surrounding starfield. NGC 6164 is 4,200 light-years away in the southern constellation of Norma.
These images show the Great Nebula in Carina (NGC 3372) in optical and infrared light.
Image Processing by Rolf Wahl Olsen
This majestic nebula is one of the largest nebulae in the sky and lies about 7,500 light years distant in the Southern constellation of Carina, The Keel.
Several star clusters containing some of the brightest and most massive stars known are found here, including the extremely luminous hypergiant star Eta Carinae - one of the prime candidates for the next supernova explosion in our galaxy.
Traditional images of the Carina Nebula taken in visible light primarily display the striking magenta colour from glowing Hydrogen gas, as well as large dark obscuring clouds of dust.
But infrared light penetrates these clouds better and allows for a deep peek into the heart of the nebula, revealing complex details and thousands of young stars that are otherwise completely invisible.
These stars shine primarily in the infrared and appear as golden red in this image. Only a minority of these are even visible in traditional images.
Credit: Matthew T. Russell
