NASA Spitzer Telescope Image: Hidden Jet

Spitzer Image HH-34

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope took this image of a baby star sprouting two identical jets (green lines emanating from fuzzy star).

The jet on the right had been seen before in visible-light views, but the jet at left, the identical twin to the first jet, could only be seen in detail with Spitzer's infrared detectors (IRAC).

The left jet was hidden behind a dark cloud, which Spitzer can see through.



The twin jets, in a system called Herbig-Haro 34 (HH-34), are made of identical knots of gas and dust, ejected one after another from the area around the star.

By studying the spacing of these knots, and knowing the speed of the jets from previous studies, astronomers were able to determine that the jet to the right of the star punches its material out 4.5 years later than the counter-jet.

Hubble Images

The new data also reveal that the area from which the jets originate is contained within a sphere around the star, with a radius of 3 astronomical units.

An astronomical unit is the distance between Earth and the sun. Previous studies estimated that the maximum size of this jet-making zone was 10 times larger.

The wispy material is gas and dust. Arc-shaped bow shocks can be seen at the ends of the twin jets. The shocks consist of compressed material in front of the jets.

The Herbig-Haro 34 (HH-34) jets are located at approximately 1,400 light-years away in the Orion constellation.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

The constellation of Orion: Astronomy Picture

The constellation of Orion holds much more than three stars in a row. A deep exposure shows everything from dark nebula to star clusters, all embedded in an extended patch of gaseous wisps in the greater Orion Molecular Cloud Complex.

The brightest three stars on the far left are indeed the famous three stars that make up the belt of Orion. Just below Alnitak, the lowest of the three belt stars, is the Flame Nebula, glowing with excited hydrogen gas and immersed in filaments of dark brown dust.

Below the frame center and just to the right of Alnitak lies the Horsehead Nebula, a dark indentation of dense dust that has perhaps the most recognized nebular shapes on the sky. On the upper right lies M42, the Orion Nebula, an energetic caldron of tumultuous gas, visible to the unaided eye, that is giving birth to a new open cluster of stars.

Immediately to the left of M42 is a prominent bluish reflection nebula sometimes called the Running Man that houses many bright blue stars. The above image, a digitally stitched composite taken over several nights, covers an area with objects that are roughly 1,500 light years away and spans about 75 light years.

Hunting Orion: Tips to Spot a Famous Constellation

Orion is the brightest and most beautiful of the winter constellations, full of fascinating objects for the curious skygazer.

CREDIT: Starry Night Software

The constellation Orion is perhaps the best known pattern in the night sky, rivaling the Big Dipper in fame, and the month of December is a great time for observers to reacquaint themselves with this celestial gem.

Formed from a distinctive pattern of bright stars, it is full of interesting and varied objects of interest to beginner and experienced astronomer alike.

Located on the celestial equator, Orion is well placed for observers in all parts of the world except in the polar regions.

As seen by observers in the northern hemisphere, Orion the Hunter is represented by two bright stars, Betelgeuse and Bellatrix, marking his shoulders, and two more bright stars, Saiph and Rigel, marking his knees.

His head is marked by Meissa and his belt, at a jaunty angle, by three stars in a line: Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka. Hanging from his belt is his sword, with the famous Orion Nebula as its centerpiece.

NASA Spitzer Image: Making a Spectacle of Star Formation in Orion

Looking like a pair of eyeglasses only a rock star would wear, this nebula brings into focus a murky region of star formation.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope exposes the depths of this dusty nebula with its infrared vision, showing stellar infants that are lost behind dark clouds when viewed in visible light.

Best known as Messier 78, the two round greenish nebulae are actually cavities carved out of the surrounding dark dust clouds.

The extended dust is mostly dark, even to Spitzer's view, but the edges show up in mid-wavelength infrared light as glowing, red frames surrounding the bright interiors.

Messier 78 is easily seen in small telescopes in the constellation of Orion, just to the northeast of Orion's belt, but looks strikingly different, with dominant, dark swaths of dust. Spitzer's infrared eyes penetrate this dust, revealing the glowing interior of the nebulae.

A string of baby stars that have yet to burn their way through their natal shells can be seen as red pinpoints on the outside of the nebula. Eventually these will blossom into their own glowing balls, turning this two-eyed eyeglass into a many-eyed monster of a nebula.

This is a three-color composite that shows infrared observations from two Spitzer instruments. Blue represents 3.6- and 4.5-micron light, and green shows light of 5.8 and 8 microns, both captured by Spitzer's infrared array camera. Red is 24-micron light detected by Spitzer's multiband imaging photometer.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Constellation of Orion

Orion Deep Wide Field by Rogelio Bernal Andreo, California, USA, 10 June 2010. A panorama of a section of the constellation of Orion, including the 3 famous stars of the belt, the Horsehead Nebula and the Orion Nebula

VISTA: The Flame Nebula in the Constellation of Orion

The Flame Nebula, a spectacular star-forming cloud of gas and dust in the constellation of Orion.

The image was taken by the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (Vista), based at the Paranal Observatory in Chile.

Picture: ESO / EPA