Tag Archive for 'Orion Molecular Cloud'

Visualization of the Radcliffe Wave. Image credit: Alyssa Goodman / Harvard University.

Our Solar System Crossed ‘Radcliffe Wave’ during Miocene Epoch, Astronomers Say

Feb 25, 2025 by Natali Anderson

As our Solar System orbits the Milky Way, it encounters various environments, including dense regions of the interstellar medium. These encounters can...

Planet-forming disks around young stars and their location within the gas-rich cloud of Taurus, roughly 600 light-years from Earth. In total, the scientists observed 43 stars in the Taurus region, all of which are pictured here (though planet-forming disks were only detected in 39 of these targets). Image credit: ESO / Garufi et al. / IRAS.

VLT Finds Protoplanetary Disks around 86 Young Stars

Mar 5, 2024 by News Staff

New observations of 86 planet-forming disks provide astronomers with a wealth of data and unique insights into how planets arise in different regions of...

This image from ESA’s Euclid spacecraft shows the Horsehead Nebula, also known as Barnard 33, a giant star-forming region located 1,375 light-years away in the constellation of Orion. Image credit: ESA / Euclid / Euclid Consortium / NASA / J.-C. Cuillandre, CEA Paris-Saclay / G. Anselmi / CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.

Euclid Captures Spectacular Image of Horsehead Nebula

Nov 9, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

The Euclid team has released a spectacularly panoramic and detailed image of the Horsehead nebula. This image from ESA’s Euclid spacecraft shows the...

This image shows the Orion Molecular Clouds, the target of the VANDAM survey; yellow dots are the locations of the observed protostars on a blue background image made by Herschel; side panels show six young protostars imaged by ALMA (blue) and the VLA (orange). Image credit: NRAO / AUI / NSF.

Astronomers Find Protoplanetary Disks in Orion Molecular Clouds

Mar 25, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers using NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array have detected 97 disks of gas and dust around...

The Flame Nebula is the large feature on the left half of the central, yellow rectangle. The smaller feature on the right is the reflection nebula NGC 2023. To the top right of NGC 2023, the iconic Horsehead Nebula seems to emerge heroically from the ‘flames.’ The three objects are part of the Orion cloud, a giant gas structure located between 1,300 and 1,600 light-years away. The different colors indicate the velocity of the gas. The Flame Nebula and its surroundings are moving away from us, with the red clouds in the background receding faster than the yellow ones in the foreground. Image credit: ESO / Thomas Stanke / J. Emerson / VISTA / Cambridge Astronomical Survey Unit.

Radio Astronomers Take Close Look at Flame Nebula

Jan 5, 2022 by News Staff

Using the recently-installed SuperCam instrument on ESO’s Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) in the Atacama Desert, Chile, astronomers have produced...

This Hubble image shows a part of the Flame Nebula, a large star-forming region in the constellation Orion that lies about 1,400 light-years from Earth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / K. Stapelfeldt, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory / Gladys Kober, NASA & Catholic University of America.

Hubble Looks for Protoplanetary Objects in Flame Nebula

Nov 24, 2021 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have spotted several ‘proplyds’ and ‘globulettes’ in the Flame Nebula. This Hubble image...

This Hubble image shows the Flame Nebula. Image credit: Hubble / NASA / ESA / N. Da Rio, University of Virginia / Gladys Kober, NASA & Catholic University of America.

Hubble Snaps Brilliant Image of Flame Nebula

Nov 22, 2021 by Enrico de Lazaro

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shot this image of a large star-forming region known as the Flame Nebula. This Hubble image shows the Flame Nebula....

This composite image shows the Orion Molecular Clouds, the target of the VANDAM survey. Yellow dots are the locations of the observed protostars on a blue background image made by ESA’s Herschel Space Observatory. Side panels show nine young protostars imaged by ALMA (blue) and the VLA (orange). Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / J. Tobin / AUI / NSF / S. Dagnello / Herschel / ESA.

Astronomers Observe Hundreds of Protoplanetary Disks in Orion Molecular Clouds

Feb 26, 2020 by News Staff

Using NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers have captured images of 328...

This composite image shows the Orion A molecular cloud, the nearest known massive star factory, as seen by ESA’s Herschel and Planck space observatories. Located approximately 1,630 light-years away, Orion A is one of the two giant molecular clouds in the Orion molecular cloud complex. The other cloud is Orion B, which lies east of Orion’s Belt. Orion A is packed full of gas -- it contains so much material, in fact, that it would be capable of producing tens of thousands of Sun-mass stars. Different colors visible here indicate the light emitted by interstellar dust grains mixed within the gas, as observed by Herschel at far-infrared and sub-millimeter wavelengths, while the texture of faint gray bands stretching across the frame, based on Planck’s measurements of the direction of the polarized light emitted by the dust, show the orientation of the magnetic field. Image credit: ESA / Herschel / Planck / J.D. Soler, Max Planck Institute for Astronomy.

Magnetic Fields Play Role in Structuring Interstellar Medium in and around Star-Forming Clouds: Study

Nov 19, 2019 by News Staff

In a new study published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, Dr. Juan Soler of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy used observations from ESA’s...

Gas in the Orion A molecular cloud; each of the three colors (red, green and blue) represents a different velocity range. Image credit: National Science Foundation / S. Kong, J. Feddersen & H. Arce, CARMA-NRO Orion Survey Team.

Astronomers Create Detailed Map of Orion A Molecular Cloud

May 22, 2018 by News Staff

The new map, created by astronomers from Yale University and elsewhere, provides unprecedented detail of the structure of the Orion A molecular cloud,...

The protostar FIR 3 with outflow that may have triggered the formation of the younger protostar FIR 4. Pullouts are individual VLA images of each protostar. Image credit: Osorio et al / NRAO / AUI / NSF.

Protostar May Have Triggered Formation of Another, Younger Star

Jun 28, 2017 by News Staff

Astronomers using NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) have found new evidence suggesting that a jet of fast-moving material ejected from an intermediate-mass...

A ribbon of ammonia -- a tracer of star-forming gas -- in the Orion Molecular Cloud as seen with the GBT (orange); background in blue is an infrared image from NASA’s WISE telescope showing the dust in the region. Image credit: R. Friesen, Dunlap Institute / J. Pineda, MPIP / GBO / AUI / NSF / NASA.

Astronomers Spot Vast Filament of Star-Forming Gas in Orion Molecular Cloud

Jun 16, 2017 by News Staff

Dr. Rachel Friesen of the University of Toronto and colleagues have captured a detailed image of a 50-light-year-long filament of star-forming gas in the...