The Pillars Of Creation
This story is not just about the Pillars Of Creation (M16, or the Eagle Nebula, photo NASA, by the Hubble Space Telescope) or the vast dimensions in space ... at the bottom I feature a short video about how the photos from space are created, especially how they become colour images.
The pillars are bathed in the scorching ultraviolet light from a cluster of young stars located just outside the frame. The winds from these stars are slowly eroding the towers of gas and dust.
Stretching roughly 4 to 5 light-years, the Pillars of Creation are a fascinating but relatively small feature of the entire Eagle Nebula, which spans 70 by 55 light-years and are in turn part of the Horsehead Nebula in the Orion Molecular Cloud.
The nebula, discovered in 1745 by the Swiss astronomer Jean-Philippe Loys de Chéseaux, is located 7,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Serpens.
I have an essay COSMOS in my book en.light.en.ment
Pillars Of Creation
a close-up of the Horsehead Nebula
with the Pillars Of Creation located at the very top
the Horsehead Nebula
the Horsehead Nebula in the Orion Molecular Cloud
a wide field view of the Orion Molecular Cloud
for a full size version of the image click here
there you can zoom in to the Horsehead
the Orion constellation, head to toe