May 4, 2014 NGC 6604, an open star cluster in Serpens Cauda Image Credit: ESO NGC 6604 (the bright grouping of stars towards to the upper left of this image) is a very young open star cluster with an age of some 4-5 million years in the star-forming (H II) region Sh2-54, located about 5,540 [continue reading]
April 29, 2014 NGC 1748, an emission nebula in the LMC Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Mohammad Heydari-Malayeri (Observatoire de Paris, France) NGC 1748 (also known as IC 2114 and N83B) is an emission nebula of roughly 55 light-years across in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way galaxy, located some [continue reading]
April 5, 2014 The Dragonfish Nebula, an emission nebula in the Crux Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Toronto The Dragonfish Nebula, named for its resemblance to a terrifyingly toothy deep-sea fish on infrared images, is an emission nebula and star-forming region of about of 450 light-years across, located some 30,000 light-years away from Earth in [continue reading]
March 16, 2014 The Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex, a dark nebula in Ophiuchus Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team The Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex (Rho Oph for short, or the Ophiuchus Molecular Cloud, and pronounced ‘oh-fee-yoo-ki’ and named after a bright star in the region) is a dark nebula, an emission and reflection nebula of about [continue reading]
March 10, 2014 NGC 2014 & NGC 2020, two bright nebulae in the LMC Image Credit: ESO NGC 2014 (irregularly-shaped and red) and its neighbor NGC 2020 (round and blue) are two brightly glowing nebulae in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy to our own Milky Way, located about 163,000 light-years away [continue reading]
January 1, 2014 The Wreath Nebula, an emission nebula in Perseus Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/WISE Team The Wreath Nebula (also known as Barnard 3 or IRAS Ring G159.6-18.5) is an emission nebula and H II region of about 22 light-years across (ring diameter), located only some 1,000 light-years away within our Milky Way galaxy in the Perseus [continue reading]