Category Archives: Orion Nebula

Hubble Space Telecope, Orion Nebula, starbirth

Finding Cosmic Favorites in Hubble’s View

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I’m celebrating the 30th anniversary of Hubble’s launch to orbit by looking at some favorites that the telescope has studied. Of all the objects it has observed (literally billions of things in the sky), one of my favorites is the Orion Nebula. It’s in the constellation Orion (which is setting earlier in the April night skies). The nebula is really part of a larger collection of clouds of gas and dust called the “Orion Molecular Complex”. What we see is the most easily visible to the naked eye. And, of course, the nebula has been observed from the ground from many other facilities, too. For example, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) has looked at it in radio frequencies to study other structures.


Hubble’s Orion

So, most of us have seen the Orion Nebula through Hubble’s eye. It’s got four very bright stars at its center, called “the Trapezium”. There are many other newborn stars in the region. The nebula also has proplyds. That’s short for “protoplanetary disks”. Those are young stars with cocoons of dust around them, and in which planets are likely forming. All this splendor is only 1,500 light-years away from us. That’s very close by, in cosmic terms. Almost in the galactic back yard.

a Hubble Space Telescope view of the Orion Nebula.
The Orion Nebula as seen by Hubble Space Telescope. Courtesy NASA/ESA/STScI

Hubble’s Multi-wavelength View

Hubble has looked at the Orion Nebula in various wavelengths of light. The most revealing view one is infrared. It allows scientists’ gaze to penetrate the clouds of gas and dust that envelope some of the most interesting features.

If you could ride through the nebula in a ship equipped with infrared “eyes”, here’s what a flight through the nebula would resemble. There are what looks like ‘caves’ and ‘inlets’ carved out of the glowing clouds that make up the nebula. Those were carved out by ultraviolet radiation from hot young stars that appear blueish in this view. But, the beauty of infrared is that it shows lower-temperature objects. That includes faint stars that we wouldn’t normally see.

Hubble’s Look at Starbirth

The Orion Nebula gives us a pretty good and up-close view of starbirth. It ranges from the earliest young stellar objects to hot blue newborns. And, future solar systems that lie hidden inside the proplyds for our distant descendants to study. That makes it one of the best laboratories for astronomers to study the birth and evolution of stars and planets. It’s truly a cosmic treasure.

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Stargazing in February

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It CAN Be Done!

The first month of the year is behind us now, leaving 11 more months of sky sights to check out. February for many northern hemisphere observers is still the winter season, so of course you have to dress warmly unless you live in relative sunny climes. For southern hemisphere viewers it’s late summer, so the dress code’s a little different. No matter what you wear, though, there ARE some great sky sights to check out.  I outline a few of them in my monthly video called Our Night Sky, produced for Astrocast.TV. You watch it here.

A chart view of Orion, showing Betelgeuse in the shoulder of the giant. The three belt stars run through the middle, and just below them is the Orion Nebula starbirth region. Courtesy Zwergelstern on Wikimedia Commons.

I always come back to Orion for my sky gazing this time of year. It’s just a gorgeous star pattern.  What I like most about Orion: it provides a lot of interesting stuff to look at. There’s Betelgeuse, for example. It’s a red supergiant star in his shoulder, and it’s likely to pop off as a supernova anytime (well, “anytime” is relative — it could be in the next million years).

Notice the three stars across Orion’s middle. Just beneath them lies a spectacular star birth region called the Orion Nebula. It’s about 1,500 light-years away from us and it just blazes with hot young stars, set among clouds of gas and dust that are still forming stars.

I’ve been stargazing since I was a kid. I didn’t always know what I was looking at, but over time (and using star charts and taking a few astronomy classes and teaching in the planetarium) I got to know the sky pretty well. You don’t have to do all that to explore the sky. You can start very simply: take it one constellation at a time.  Look at it with your naked eye, then scan it with binoculars or a small telescope.  Chances are, you’ll find something cool and interesting to check out each time you look.

People often ask me what star charts they should get. I always recommend they check out Sky&Telescope.com or Astronomy.com. Those two sites (and their associated magazines) have very useful star charts that you can customize for your location. If you have an iPhone or an iPad, you can get a wonderful app called Starmap. (Disclosure: I’m working on a project for these guys, but I was using their sky maps (free of charge on their site) long before they contacted me to work with them.)  I also very much like Skymaps, which provides both northern and southern hemisphere charts.  I also wrote about some good astronomy books and apps just before Christmas — check them out  here and here if you’re looking for some more extensive, tree-based information about where to look during your sky gazing sessions.  Now, get out there and check out the sky!  (Just be sure and dress for the weather!)