The Orion Nebula showing three populations of young stars

OmegaCAM — the wide-field optical camera on ESO’s VLT Survey Telescope (VST) — has captured the spectacular Orion Nebula and its associated cluster of young stars in great detail,  producing this beautiful new image. This famous object, the birthplace of many massive stars, is one of the closest stellar nurseries, at a distance of about 1350 light-years.

On this plot different populations of young stars are marked in different colours. The blue ones are oldest and the red youngest, with green ones an intermediate age. These stars seems to have formed in three bursts of star formation during the last three million years.

Crediti:

ESO/G. Beccari

Riguardo l'immagine

Identificazione:eso1723c
Tipo:Collage
Data di rilascio:Giovedì 27 Luglio 2017 12:00
Notizie relative:eso1723
Grandezza:16877 x 13107 px

Riguardo all'oggetto

Nome:Orion Nebula
Tipo:Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Emission : H II Region
Categoria:Nebulae

Formati delle immagini

JPEG grande
65,3 MB

Zoom


Sfondi

1024x768
257,0 KB
1280x1024
372,5 KB
1600x1200
491,2 KB
1920x1200
558,0 KB
2048x1536
717,7 KB

Colori e filtri

BandaLunghezza d'ondaTelescopio
Ottico
G
480 nmVLT Survey Telescope
OmegaCAM
Ottico
r
625 nmVLT Survey Telescope
OmegaCAM
Ottico
i
770 nmVLT Survey Telescope
OmegaCAM
Ottico
H-alpha
659 nmVLT Survey Telescope
OmegaCAM