A new image from NASA’s WISE mission has been released showing the beauty of a region of the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex known as the Flame Nebula.
The Flame Nebula as seen by WISE Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The nebula is glowing with infra-red light thanks in no small part to a star 20 times the mass of our own sun that is blanketed with a dense surround of dust and gas. The star churns out vast quantities of energy that warm the dust causing it in turn to give of the infra-red light that has been collected to form this image.
The surrounding dust is so dense it causes the star to appear an amazing 4 billion times fainter to the naked eye than if it was free in space. Without this obscuring dust that star would appear as bright as the stars of Orion’s belt itself.
The smaller bright region about half way down the image is the nebula NGC 2023 – A reflection nebula surrounding a bright B class star
NGC 2023 Credit: Adam Block/NOAO/AURA/NSF
Slightly below and to the right of NGC 2023, the tuft of protruding material is actually the famous Horsehead Nebula:
The Horsehead Nebula Credit: ESO
The final remarkable feature in this image is the bright red crescent in its lower right portion. This is the bowshock – a wave of material deflected out of the way of a moving star – of the star Sigma Orionis.
You can read more about this image here
