Silhouette disc seen in M 17

Ks-band image of the silhouette disc obtained with the NACO Adaptive Optics camera at the 8.2-m VLT YEPUN telescope at Paranal. White contours delineate the densest part of the disc (inner torus). The visible stars (slightly elongated due to the adaptive optics technique) are embedded within the molecular cloud but are probably unrelated to the disc. The insert shows a deconvolved zoomed version of the central object of about 450 x 240 AU; its major axis is tilted by about 15 degrees against the direction perpendicular to the disc.