Credit: NASA, ESA, and K. Stapelfeldt (Jet Propulsion Laboratory); Processing; Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America).
This Hubble Space Telescope image captures a part of the reflection nebula IC 2631, which contains a protostar, the hot, dense core of a forming star that is building up gas and dust. Eventually, the protostar may gravitationally collect enough matter to begin nuclear blend and emit its own energy and starlight.
Reflection nebulae are clouds of gas and dust that reflect the light from nearby stars. The starlight spreads through the gas and dust like a flashlight beam shining on mist in the dark and brightens it. These nebulae are often bluish in color due to the fact that of the way light scatters when it hits the great dust of the interstellar medium.
Hubble observed this nebula while looking for disks of gas and dust around young stars. Such disks are left over from the development of the star and might ultimately form worlds.
By NASA
December 22, 2021
