Giant Orion molecular cloud seen in infrared
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The image on the left shows a large part of the Orion nebula as it appears in visible light. The heart of the giant Orion molecular cloud, OMC-1, is included in the relatively dim and featureless area inside the blue outline near the top of the image. NICMOS's infrared vision reveals a chaotic, active star birth region (as seen in the right-hand image). Here, stars and glowing interstellar dust, heated by and scattering the intense starlight, appear yellow-orange. Emission by excited hydrogen molecules appears blue. The image is oriented with north up and east to the left. The diagonal extent of the image is about 0.4 light-years. Some details are as small as the size of our solar system. |