Posted on 08/05/2022 4:04:23 PM PDT by MtnClimber
Explanation: The beautiful Trifid Nebula is a cosmic study in contrasts. Also known as M20, it lies about 5,000 light-years away toward the nebula rich constellation Sagittarius. A star forming region in the plane of our galaxy, the Trifid does illustrate three different types of astronomical nebulae; red emission nebulae dominated by light from hydrogen atoms, blue reflection nebulae produced by dust reflecting starlight, and dark nebulae where dense dust clouds appear in silhouette. But the red emission region, roughly separated into three parts by obscuring dust lanes, is what lends the Trifid its popular name. Pillars and jets sculpted by newborn stars, above and right of the emission nebula's center, appear in famous Hubble Space Telescope close-up images of the region. The Trifid Nebula is about 40 light-years across. Too faint to be seen by the unaided eye, it almost covers the area of a full moon in planet Earth's sky. Open star cluster M21 just peeks into this telescopic field of view along the bottom right edge of the frame.
For more detail go to the link and click on the image for a high definition image. You can then move the magnifying glass cursor then click to zoom in and click again to zoom out. When zoomed in you can scan by moving the side bars on the bottom and right side of the image.
nice
I never thought about this before.. but how is it possible that there is gas in a vacuum?
Beat me to it!
The gas is gravitationally bound to itself. Also some dust and other debris keeping it from dispersing equally throughout space.
When the gas is disturbed enough that it coalesces, when it becomes dense enough, that is how stars form.
Read “Day of the Triffids” back in the 60’s and just reread it last year - still a great book, (and a great older SHTF book like Alas Babylon).
It’s lovely. It’s also completely imaginary, an arbitrary interpretation of collected electromagnetic radiation from well outside the wavelengths the human eye can detect.
Space is not empty. Even in the areas we consider "empty," there's a few hydrogen atoms in every cubic meter of space. So it all depends on your definition of "a vacuum."
Not unlike "weightlessness." Which doesn't exist, because gravity never stops. It's everywhere, even if only weakly. If there were only two heavenly bodies, and they were on the opposite sides of the universe, eventually they would crash into each other because of their gravities.
Nonetheless, back when NASA still could find its ass in the dark, Walter Crankcase used to go on TV and regale us with stories of "weightlessness" and "the emptiness of space," and people believed him. Still do.
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