Emission Nebula NGC 6357

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This image, taken by astronomers using the US Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera on the Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, a Program of NSF's NOIRLab, captures the emission nebula and star-forming region NGC 6357, which is located 8000 light-years away in the direction of the constellation Scorpius. This image reveals bright, young stars surrounded by billowing clouds of dust and gas inside NGC 6357, which is also known as the Lobster Nebula.

NGC 6357 is spanning about 400 light years. The central region in this image is home to Pismis 24, a star cluster that includes some of the most massive stars in our galaxy, some hundreds of times more massive than our own sun.

Image Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA

T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF's NOIRLab), J. Miller (Gemini Observatory/NSF's NOIRLab), M. Zamani and D. de Martin (NSF's NOIRLab)

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Reflection Nebula Bernes 149 in Absorption Nebula Lupus 3

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The massive, star-forming interstellar cloud Lupus 3 is captured with the 570-megapixel US Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera at the National Science Foundation's NOIRLab's Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. The dazzling central region of this sprawling cloud reveals a pair of infant stars bursting from their natal cocoons of dust and gas to illuminate the reflection nebula known as Bernes 149. These contrasting regions make this object a prime target of research on star formation. This star-forming nebula is located about 500 light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Lupus (the Wolf).

The clashing of energy and matter can lead to fantastical sites on Earth, such as glowing auroras and powerful lightning displays. The same can be said about space, where energy from bright young stars and protostars floods their surroundings, illuminating vast interstellar clouds of dust and gas to create spectacular objects known as reflection nebulae.

The two blue stars blazing in the center of the sprawling nebula, known as HR 5999 and HR 6000, illuminate nearby gas and dust, creating the bright blue reflection nebula Bernes 149. These stars grew out of the dark nebula Lupus 3, which stretches like a blanket across the background of stars. This cloud is not just a coal-black cosmic blob, however. It is home to a fleet of infant stars known as T Tauri stars, which will eventually use the material of Lupus 3 to grow into fully fledged stars.

At the relatively young age of about 1 million years, HR 5999 and HR 6000 are the oldest of the stars in the Lupus 3 region. These stars are pre-main-sequence stars, meaning that despite their brightness, they are not yet powered by nuclear fusion, like our Sun. They are instead powered by gravity, which compresses and heats up the internal matter. These sibling stars have blown away nearby gas and dust, illuminating the remnants and creating the Bernes 149 reflection nebula.

Lupus 3 is one of at least nine clouds within the massive Lupus cloud complex. Lupus 3 itself stretches across an area of the sky equivalent to about 24 Moon-diameters as seen from Earth. With a whopping 2.2-degree field of view, DECcam can capture massive objects like Lupus 3 in a single image.

Image Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA/ T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF's NOIRLab)

Image Processing: D. de Martin and M. Zamani (NSF's NOIRLab)

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Peculiar Galaxy NGC 7727

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Gemini South, one half of the International Gemini Observatory operated by NSF's NOIRLab, captured NGC 7727. This giant was born from the merger of two galaxies, an event that started around a billion years ago. At its center lies the closest pair of supermassive black holes ever found, two objects that are destined to coalesce into an even more massive black hole.

Just as you may bump into someone on a busy street, galaxies too can bump into each other. But while galactic interactions are much more violent than a bump on a busy street, individual stars don't generally collide since, compared to their sizes, the distances between them are very large. Rather, the galaxies dance around each other, with gravity creating tidal forces that dramatically change the look of the two dance partners. "Tails" of stars, gas and dust are spun around the galaxies as they eventually form a new, merged galaxy, resulting in the disordered and beautifully asymmetrical shape that we see in NGC 7727.

Also visible in this image are two bright points at the center of the galaxy, another telltale sign of its dramatic past. The core of NGC 7727 still consists of the original two galactic cores, each hosting a supermassive black hole. Located about 89 million light-years away from Earth, in the constellation of Aquarius, this is the closest pair of supermassive black holes to us.

The black holes in NGC 7727 are observed to be just 1600 light-years apart in the sky and are expected to merge within 250 million years, the blink of an eye in astronomical time. When the black holes merge they will create an even more massive black hole.

Our home galaxy, which also sports a supermassive black hole at its center, is on a path to merge with our closest large neighbour, the Andromeda Galaxy, billions of years from now. Perhaps the resulting galaxy will look something similar to the cosmic dance we see in NGC 7727, so this image could be giving us a glimpse into the future.

Image Credit: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA

Acknowledgment: PI: C. Onken (Australian National University)

Image processing: T.A. Rector (University of Alaska Anchorage/NSF's NOIRLab), J. Miller (International Gemini Observatory/NSF's NOIRLab), M. Rodriguez (International Gemini Observatory/NSF’s NOIRLab), M. Zamani (NSF's NOIRLab)

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 1559 as seen by Webb

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This image features the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1559 as seen by the James Webb Space Telescope. The galaxy hosts a visible central region with a distinct open pattern in the loosely-wound spiral arms. NGC 1559 resides approximately 35 million light-years away in the little-observed southern constellation Reticulum (The Reticule).

The data featured in this portrait make use of two of Webb's instruments: the Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) and Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam). Here MIRI captures the glow of interstellar dust grains, which trace out the interstellar medium, the fuel for future star formation. NIRCam shows the light from stars, even young stars hidden behind prodigious amounts of dust. NIRCam also captures emission from ionised nebulae around young stars.

The data were collected by the PHANGS team as part of an observing programme in which Webb will observe 55 galaxies that have also been mapped by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) radio telescope, the Hubble Space Telescope and more. By combining Webb's unprecedented view of the dust and stars with data from these other facilities, the team aims to obtain a new, highly detailed view of how stars are born, live, and die in galaxies across the Universe. This is also a Treasury programme, which means that the data will have no exclusive access period and so the scientific community (and others, including the general public) can access the data immediately. This has the advantage that more research can be done with the data more quickly.

NGC 1559 has massive spiral arms that abound with star formation, and it is receding from us at a speed of about 1300 kilometers per second. Although NGC 1559 appears to sit near one of our nearest neighbours in the sky – the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) – this is just a trick of perspective. In reality, NGC 1559 is physically nowhere near the LMC in space; in fact it truly is a loner, lacking the company of any nearby galaxies or membership of any galaxy cluster. NGC 1559 may be alone in space, but with Webb we are admiring from far away.

Image Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA and CSA, A. Leroy, J. Lee and the PHANGS Team

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Star-Forming Region NGC 604 as seen by Webb

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This image from the James Webb Space Telescope's NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) of star-forming region NGC 604 shows how stellar winds from bright, hot young stars carve out cavities in surrounding gas and dust.

Sheltered among NGC 604's dusty envelopes of gas are more than 200 of the hottest, most massive kinds of stars, all in the early stages of their lives. These types of stars are known as B-types and O-types, the latter of which can be more than 100 times the mass of our own Sun. It’s quite rare to find this concentration of them in the nearby Universe. In fact, there’s no similar region within our own Milky Way galaxy. This concentration of massive stars, combined with its relatively close distance, means NGC 604 gives astronomers an opportunity to study these objects at a fascinating time early in their life.

In Webb's near-infrared NIRCam image, the most noticeable features are tendrils and clumps of emission that appear bright red, extending out from areas that look like clearings, or large bubbles in the nebula. Stellar winds from the brightest and hottest young stars have carved out these cavities, while ultraviolet radiation ionises the surrounding gas. This ionised hydrogen appears as a white and blue ghostly glow.

The bright orange streaks in the Webb near-infrared image signify the presence of carbon-based molecules known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs. This material plays an important role in the interstellar medium and the formation of stars and planets, but its origin is a mystery. As you travel further from the immediate clearings of dust, the deeper red signifies molecular hydrogen. This cooler gas is a prime environment for star formation.

Webb's exquisite resolution also provides insights into features that previously appeared unrelated to the main cloud. For example, in Webb's image, there are two bright, young stars carving out holes in dust above the central nebula, connected through diffuse red gas. In visible-light imaging from the Hubble Space Telescope, these appeared as separate splotches.

Webb's view in mid-infrared wavelengths also illustrates a new perspective on the diverse and dynamic activity of this region. Some of the stars seen in this image from the surrounding galaxy are red supergiants – stars that are cool but very large, hundreds of times the diameter of our Sun. Additionally, some of the background galaxies that appeared in the NIRCam image also fade.

NGC 604 is estimated to be around 3.5 million years old. The cloud of glowing gases extends to some 1300 light-years across.

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Barred Spiral Galaxy NGC 3783

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This image features NGC 3783, a bright barred spiral galaxy about 130 million light-years from Earth, that also lends its name to the eponymous NGC 3783 galaxy group. Like galaxy clusters, galaxy groups are aggregates of gravitationally bound galaxies. Galaxy groups, however, are less massive and contain fewer members than galaxy clusters do: where galaxy clusters can contain hundreds or even thousands of constituent galaxies, galaxy groups do not typically include more than 50. The Milky Way is actually part of a galaxy group, known as the Local Group, which contains two other large galaxies (Andromeda and the Triangulum galaxy), as well as several dozen satellite and dwarf galaxies. The NGC 3783 galaxy group, meanwhile, contains 47 galaxies. It also seems to be at a fairly early stage of its evolution, making it an interesting object of study.

Whilst the focus of this image is the spiral galaxy NGC 3783, the eye is equally drawn to the very bright object in the lower right part of this image. This is the star HD 101274. The perspective in this image makes the star and the galaxy look like close companions, but this is an illusion. HD 101274 lies only about 1530 light-years from Earth, meaning it is about 85 thousand times closer than NGC 3783. This explains how a single star can appear to outshine an entire galaxy!

NGC 3783 is a type-1 Seyfert galaxy, which is a galaxy with a bright central region – so it's particularly bright itself, as far as galaxies go. In this image it is recorded by Hubble in incredible detail, from its glowing central bar to its narrow, winding arms and the dust threaded through them, thanks to five separate images taken in different wavelengths of light. In fact, the galactic centre is bright enough to Hubble that it exhibits diffraction spikes, normally only seen on stars such as HD 101274.

Image Credit: ESA/Hubble and NASA, M. C. Bentz, D. J. V. Rosario

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure

Peculiar Lenticular Galaxy NGC 2685

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The very unusual galaxy NGC 2685, also known as the Helix Galaxy, is located about 40 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. This image was captured by the Gemini North telescope, one half of the International Gemini Observatory, operated by NSF NOIRLab which is funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation.

NGC 2685 is a peculiar lenticular galaxy known as a polar ring galaxy. A ring of gas, stars, and dust orbits NGC 2685 perpendicular to the flat plane of the host galaxy. This odd crossing of planes is believed to be evidence of galaxy interactions, mergers, or tidal accretion events. Current research suggests that the present structure of NGC 2685 was formed when it captured material from another galaxy, which was strung out into an encircling ring.

This galaxy is one of our closest known polar ring galaxies and is therefore one of the easiest of its kind to study. Owing to its odd characteristics, it has been called the most unusual galaxy in the Shapley-Ames Catalog of Bright Galaxies and appears as number 336 in astronomer Halton Arp's Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies.

Image Credit: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/L. Bassino

Image processing: J. Miller (Gemini Observatory/NSF's NOIRLab), M. Rodriguez (Gemini Observatory/NSF's NOIRLab), and M. Zamani (NSF's NOIRLab)

Image enhancement: Jean-Baptiste Faure