NGC 1999
Just weeks after NASA astronauts repaired the Hubble Space Telescope in December 1999, Hubble snapped this picture of NGC 1999, a nebula in the constellation Orion. Astronomers used Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) to obtain the color image.
NGC 1999 is an example of a reflection nebula. Like fog around a street lamp, a reflection nebula shines only because the light from an embedded source illuminates its dust; the nebula does not emit any visible light of its own. NGC 1999 lies close to the famous Orion Nebula, about 1,500 light-years from Earth, in a region of our Milky Way Galaxy where new stars are being formed actively. The nebula is famous in astronomical history because the first Herbig-Haro object was discovered immediately adjacent to it (it lies just outside this Hubble image). Herbig-Haro objects are now known to be jets of gas ejected from very young stars.
The NGC 1999 nebula is illuminated by a bright, recently formed star, visible in the Hubble photo just to the left of center. This star is cataloged as V380 Orionis, and its white color is due to its high surface temperature of about 10,000 degrees Celsius (nearly twice that of our own Sun). Its mass is estimated to be 3.5 times that of the Sun. The star is so young that it is still surrounded by a cloud of material left over from its formation, seen as the NGC 1999 reflection nebula.
The WFPC2 image of NGC 1999 shows a remarkable jet-black cloud near its center, resembling a letter T tilted on its side, located just to the right and lower right of the bright star. This dark cloud was initially thought to be a "Bok globule," a cold cloud of gas, molecules, and cosmic dust that is so dense it blocks all of the light behind it. (Bok globules are named after the late astronomer Bart Bok.) However, infrared observations reveal that the dark region is more likely a hole in the nebula.
NGC 1999 was discovered some two centuries ago by Sir William Herschel and his sister Caroline, and was cataloged later in the 19th century as object 1999 in the New General Catalogue.
For more information please visit: hubblesite.org/image/952/news_release/2000-10
Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI)
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NGC 1999
Just weeks after NASA astronauts repaired the Hubble Space Telescope in December 1999, Hubble snapped this picture of NGC 1999, a nebula in the constellation Orion. Astronomers used Hubble's Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) to obtain the color image.
NGC 1999 is an example of a reflection nebula. Like fog around a street lamp, a reflection nebula shines only because the light from an embedded source illuminates its dust; the nebula does not emit any visible light of its own. NGC 1999 lies close to the famous Orion Nebula, about 1,500 light-years from Earth, in a region of our Milky Way Galaxy where new stars are being formed actively. The nebula is famous in astronomical history because the first Herbig-Haro object was discovered immediately adjacent to it (it lies just outside this Hubble image). Herbig-Haro objects are now known to be jets of gas ejected from very young stars.
The NGC 1999 nebula is illuminated by a bright, recently formed star, visible in the Hubble photo just to the left of center. This star is cataloged as V380 Orionis, and its white color is due to its high surface temperature of about 10,000 degrees Celsius (nearly twice that of our own Sun). Its mass is estimated to be 3.5 times that of the Sun. The star is so young that it is still surrounded by a cloud of material left over from its formation, seen as the NGC 1999 reflection nebula.
The WFPC2 image of NGC 1999 shows a remarkable jet-black cloud near its center, resembling a letter T tilted on its side, located just to the right and lower right of the bright star. This dark cloud was initially thought to be a "Bok globule," a cold cloud of gas, molecules, and cosmic dust that is so dense it blocks all of the light behind it. (Bok globules are named after the late astronomer Bart Bok.) However, infrared observations reveal that the dark region is more likely a hole in the nebula.
NGC 1999 was discovered some two centuries ago by Sir William Herschel and his sister Caroline, and was cataloged later in the 19th century as object 1999 in the New General Catalogue.
For more information please visit: hubblesite.org/image/952/news_release/2000-10
Credit: NASA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI)
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