Tag Archives: Eagle Nebula

Behold: countless newborn stars forming in the Eagle Nebula. To wit:

Gravitationally contracting in pillars of dense gas and dust, the intense radiation of these newly-formed bright stars is causing surrounding material to boil away. This image, taken with the Hubble Space Telescope in near infrared light, allows the viewer to see through much of the thick dust that makes the pillars opaque in visible light. The giant structures are light years in length and dubbed informally the Pillars of Creation. Associated with the open star cluster M16, the Eagle Nebula lies about 6,500 light years away. The Eagle Nebula is an easy target for small telescopes in a nebula-rich part of the sky toward the split constellation Serpens Cauda (the tail of the snake).

Previously: Behold The Pillars Of Creation

(Image: NASA, ESA, Hubble, HLA; Processing: Luis Romero)

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A new, even higher definition composite photo of the (7000 light years distant) Eagle Nebula’s ‘Pillars of Creation’ taken by the (since massively upgraded) Hubble telescope, contrasted with a similar image taken by the array back in 1995.

Hubblesite sez of it:

The pillars are bathed in the blistering ultraviolet light from a grouping of young, massive stars located off the top of the image. Streamers of gas can be seen bleeding off pillars as the intense radiation heats and evaporates it into space. Denser regions of the pillars are shadowing material beneath them from the powerful radiation. Stars are being born deep inside the pillars, which are made of cold hydrogen gas laced with dust. The pillars are part of a small region of the Eagle Nebula, a vast star-forming region 6,500 light-years from Earth.

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