Happy Valentine’s Day!
- By Maggie Masetti
- February 14, 2014
- Comments Off on Happy Valentine’s Day!
Happy Valentine’s Day from NASA Blueshift. We spotted this image go by on social media this morning and Rick Wiggins was kind enough to grant us permission to repost it. This is the Heart Nebula, or IC 1805. It’s about 7500 light years away from Earth, and can be located in the constellation Cassiopeia. The nebula actually sits in the Perseus arm of our galaxy, while the Sun is nearby (astronomically speaking, anyway) in the Orion Arm.
This nebula, made of dusty dark clouds and hot glowing gas, has a cluster of newborn stars near “heart” center, called Melotte 15.
Heart Nebula, Credit: Rick Wiggins. Used with permission.
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