Glowing stellar nurseries*

Colour composite image of RCW120. It reveals how an expanding bubble of ionised gas about ten light-years across is causing the surrounding material to collapse into dense clumps where new stars are then formed. The 870-micron submillimetre-wavelength data were taken with the LABOCA camera on the 12-m Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope. Here, the submillimetre emission is shown as the blue clouds surrounding the reddish glow of the ionised gas (shown with data from the SuperCosmos H-alpha survey). The image also contains data from the Second Generation Digitized Sky Survey (I-band shown in blue, R-band shown in red).

This image is available as a mounted image in the ESOshop

Credit:

ESO/APEX/DSS2/ SuperCosmos/ Deharveng(LAM)/ Zavagno(LAM)

About the Image

Id:eso0840a
Type:Observation
Release date:11 November 2008
Related releases:eso0840
Size:1872 x 2348 px

About the Object

Name:RCW120
Type:Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Emission : H II Region
Milky Way : Nebula : Type : Star Formation
Distance:4500 light years
Constellation:Scorpius
Category:Nebulae

Mounted Image

Image Formats

Large JPEG
2.3 MB
Screensize JPEG
700.5 KB

Wallpapers

1024x768
512.4 KB
1280x1024
807.1 KB
1600x1200
1.1 MB
1920x1200
1.2 MB
2048x1536
1.6 MB

Coordinates

Position (RA):17 12 24.03
Position (Dec):-38° 28' 11.49"
Field of view:31.40 x 39.38 arcminutes
Orientation:North is 1.8° right of vertical

Colours & filters

BandWavelengthTelescope
Optical
B
Digitized Sky Survey 2
N/A
Millimeter
Submillimetre
870 μmAtacama Pathfinder Experiment
LABOCA
Optical
Pseudogreen (R+I)
Digitized Sky Survey 2
N/A
Optical
R
Other
N/A
Optical
R
Digitized Sky Survey 2
N/A