Starry Critters

Tag: NGC 2024

Intense Flames

by CritterKeeper on Jan.15, 2010, under Plants/Flowers

Credit: ESO/J. Emerson/VISTA.

What looks like a flame, or a cos­mic jel­ly­fish, is seen shoot­ing out of the rich star–form­ing region of the Flame Neb­ula. Also known as NGC 2024, the Flame Neb­ula shows a bright group of stars light­ing up the region with the core com­pletely hid­den behind a pil­lar of dust. Intense ultra­vi­o­let light and strong winds come from bright, new stars deep in the heart of the Flame Neb­ula. The ultra­vi­o­let light excites atoms inside the neb­ula caus­ing it to glow. Usu­ally we see great images like this from NASA’s Hub­ble Space Tele­scope. This image comes to us from the giant, 4.1-meter VISTA tele­scope, the world’s largest sur­vey tele­scope.

(con­tinue read­ing…)

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