Suggested Searches

 

1 min read

Hubble’s Black and White View of the Universe

Against a dark swath of space, a bright cloudy region is in the center, roughly resembling the shape of a pig.

Contained within the most massive and active star-forming region in the nearby galaxy, the Small Magellanic Cloud, star cluster NGC 346 delivers energetic radiation that excites nearby gas, causing it to glow. The result is one of the most dynamic and intricately detailed images of a nearby star-forming region that has ever been taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

The complexity of the gas and dust that surrounds NGC 346 shows a series of arched, ragged filaments and a distinct ridge created when high-energy radiation from the young, hot stars eats into the denser areas of the nearby interstellar medium. The intricate, dark beaded edge of the ridge, seen from Hubble's perspective in silhouette, contains several small dust globules that point back towards the central cluster.

Energetic outflows and radiation from hot young stars are eroding the dense outer portions of the star-forming region, formally known as N66, exposing new stellar nurseries. The diffuse natal parts of the nebula block the energetic outflows from streaming away from the cluster, leaving a series of filaments marking the path of the outflows.

This image of NGC 346 and its surrounding star formation was taken with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys in July 2004 using a filter which isolates light emitted by hydrogen gas. Individual images from Hubble's cameras retain no color information as such, other than the color of a filter, which selects a range of wavelengths from the full spectrum of light. A black and white (monochrome) image most realistically represents the range of brightness in such a single image. Color images may be reconstructed by combining several images made through different filters and assigning a distinct color to each image. Even without the added color dimension, the wide range of gray tones in the black and white image reveals a great deal of the nebula's finely detailed structure.

About the Object

  • R.A. Position
    R.A. PositionRight ascension – analogous to longitude – is one component of an object's position.
    00h 59m 17.99s
  • Dec. Position
    Dec. PositionDeclination – analogous to latitude – is one component of an object's position.
    -72° 10' 48.0"
  • Constellation
    ConstellationOne of 88 recognized regions of the celestial sphere in which the object appears.
    Tucana
  • Distance
    DistanceThe physical distance from Earth to the astronomical object. Distances within our solar system are usually measured in Astronomical Units (AU). Distances between stars are usually measured in light-years. Interstellar distances can also be measured in parsecs.
    210,000 light-years away (64,000 parsecs)
  • Dimensions
    DimensionsThe physical size of the object or the apparent angle it subtends on the sky.
    This image is 4.7 arcminutes (280 light-years or 87 parsecs).

About the Data

  • Data Description
    Data DescriptionProposal: A description of the observations, their scientific justification, and the links to the data available in the science archive.
    Science Team: The astronomers who planned the observations and analyzed the data. "PI" refers to the Principal Investigator.
    The Hubble image was created from HST data from proposal 10248: A. Nota (STScI/ESA), M. Sirianni (STScI/ESA), E. Sabbi (STScI), M. Tosi (INAF - Bologna Observ.), J.S. Gallagher (Univ. of Wisconsin), M. Meixner (STScI), M. Clampin (GSFC), S. Oey (Univ. of Michigan), A. Pasquali (ETH Zurich), L. Smith (Univ. College London), and R. Walterbos (New Mexico State Univ.).
  • Instrument
    InstrumentThe science instrument used to produce the data.
    HST>ACS/WFC
  • Exposure Dates
    Exposure DatesThe date(s) that the telescope made its observations and the total exposure time.
    July 2004
  • Filters
    FiltersThe camera filters that were used in the science observations.
    F658N (H-alpha)
  • Object Name
    Object NameA name or catalog number that astronomers use to identify an astronomical object.
    NGC 346
  • Object Description
    Object DescriptionThe type of astronomical object.
    Cluster and Nebulosity in the Small Magellanic Cloud
  • Release Date
    November 10, 2005
  • Science Release
    Young Stars Sculpt Gas with Powerful Outflows
    Read the release
  • Credit
    NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); Acknowledgment: A. Nota (STScI/ESA)

Downloads

  • 3438 × 3888
    jpg (5.9 MB)
  • 3438 × 3888
    tif (8.05 MB)
  • 707 × 800
    jpg (80.94 KB)
  • PDF
    (1.21 MB)
  • 2400 × 3000
    (735.17 KB)
  • 200 × 200
    (7.74 KB)
  • 354 × 400
    (25.03 KB)
  • 600 × 750
    (66.15 KB)
Compass and Scale
Compass and ScaleAn astronomical image with a scale that shows how large an object is on the sky, a compass that shows how the object is oriented on the sky, and the filters with which the image was made.

Related Images & Videos

Against a dark swath of space, a bright pink, cloudy region is in the center, roughly resembling the shape of a pig.

Young Stars Sculpt Gas with Powerful Outflows in the Small Magellanic Cloud

This is a Hubble Space Telescope view of one of the most dynamic and intricately detailed star-forming regions in space, located 210,000 light-years away in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way. At the center of the region is a brilliant star...

Share

Details

Last Updated
Mar 28, 2025
Contact
Media

Claire Andreoli
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, Maryland
claire.andreoli@nasa.gov

Related Terms

Keep Exploring

Discover More Topics From NASA

Hubble Space Telescope

Since its 1990 launch, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed our fundamental understanding of the universe.

Hubble Science Highlights

Hubble Images

Hubble News