Glowing stellar nurseries* (original) (raw)

Colour composite image of RCW120. It reveals how an expanding bubble of ionised gas about ten light-years across is causing the surrounding material to collapse into dense clumps where new stars are then formed. The 870-micron submillimetre-wavelength data were taken with the LABOCA camera on the 12-m Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope. Here, the submillimetre emission is shown as the blue clouds surrounding the reddish glow of the ionised gas (shown with data from the SuperCosmos H-alpha survey). The image also contains data from the Second Generation Digitized Sky Survey (I-band shown in blue, R-band shown in red).

This image is available as a mounted image in the ESOshop

Credit:

ESO/APEX/DSS2/ SuperCosmos/ Deharveng(LAM)/ Zavagno(LAM)

About the Image

Id: eso0840a
Type: Observation
Release date: 11 November 2008
Related releases: eso0840
Size: 1872 x 2348 px

About the Object

Name: RCW120
Type: Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Emission : H II RegionMilky Way : Nebula : Type : Star Formation
Distance: 4500 light years
Constellation: Scorpius
Category: Nebulae

Mounted Image

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Coordinates

Position (RA): 17 12 24.03
Position (Dec): -38° 28' 11.49"
Field of view: 31.40 x 39.38 arcminutes
Orientation: North is 1.8° right of vertical

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