Nebula NGC 6357 in Scorpius: Carved by Massive Stars | ESO

Nebula NGC 6357 in Scorpius: Carved by Massive Stars | ESO

This image, captured by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Paranal, shows a small part of the well-known emission nebula, NGC 6357, located about 8,000 light-years away, in the tail of the southern constellation of Scorpius (The Scorpion). The image glows with the characteristic red of an H II region, and contains a large amount of ionized and excited hydrogen gas.

The cloud is bathed in intense ultraviolet radiation—mainly from the open star cluster Pismis 24, home to massive, young, blue stars, that it re-emits as visible light, in this distinctive red hue.

The cluster itself is out of the field of view of this picture, its diffuse light seen illuminating the cloud on the center-right of the image. We are looking at a close-up of the surrounding nebula, showing a mesh of gas, dark dust, and newly born and still forming stars.

Credit: European Southern Observatory (ESO)
Date: Aug. 26, 2013

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