Using Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope in Chile, an international team of astronomers has taken one of the finest images of a star formation region in the constellation of Taurus.
A sinuous filament of cosmic dust in the Taurus Molecular Cloud (ESO/APEX / MPIfR /ESO / OSO / A. Hacar et al / Digitized Sky Survey 2 / Davide De Martin)
The image shows two parts of a sinuous filament of cosmic dust in the Taurus Molecular Cloud, which are known as Barnard 211 and Barnard 213.
This long, filamentary structure lies about 450 light-years away from Earth. It is one of the closest regions of star formation. In it, newborn stars are hidden, and dense clouds of gas are on the verge of collapsing to form yet more stars.
In visible light, the region appears as dark lanes, lacking in stars. However, the cosmic dust grains themselves emit a faint heat glow but, as they are extremely cold at around -260 degrees Celsius, their light can only be seen at wavelengths of around one millimeter.
The millimeter-range observations from the LABOCA camera on APEX reveal the heat glow of the dust grains, shown on the image in orange tones.
The upper-right part of the filament is Barnard 211, while the lower-left part is Barnard 213.
The bright star above the filament is φ Tauri, while the one partially visible at the left-hand edge of the image is HD 27482. Both stars are closer to us than the filament, and are not associated with it.
