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Floating like a giant space butterfly, the nebula W40 is composed of two glowing bubbles of hot gas puffed up by radiation from the massive stars forming within its core. [...]

This month, let's try something a little different. Rather than looking for visible objects, we are going to look for the invisible. We are hunting for dark nebulae. Due to [...]

TEMPER TANTRUM. At just over 150,000 light-years from Earth, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is bursting with newly formed stars. In a paper published January 24 in Nature, astronomers homed [...]

Like birds of a feather, the Pelican Nebula (IC 5070) flocks together with Cygnus the Swan. This small piece of the Pelican lies just 2[degrees] southeast of the 1st-magnitude star [...]

OFF THE CHARTS. In a paper published August 17 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, researchers used the highest-frequency receivers of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submiNimeter Array (ALMA) to look for emissions [...]

Captured with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, this image shows the bright glow of IC 63, also called the Ghost Nebula, 550 light-years away in the constellation Cassiopeia. This massive cloud [...]

MEOW! This infrared image, captured with the Infrared Array Camera and Multiband Imaging Photometer instruments on NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, shows the Cat's Paw Nebula (NGC 6334) in stunning detail. [...]

This vivid but ominous image--taken with the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph (FORS2) instrument on the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope--shows NGC 2467, otherwise known as the [...]

Revealing your heart to someone takes time. In the case of IC 1805--a hot cloud of gas near the constellation Cassiopeia--the revelation has taken 7,500 years. That's how long light [...]

In last month's column I toured some of the deep-sky delights in the den of Vulpecula, the Little Fox. Now I'd like to continue that expedition starting with M27, commonly [...]

I WAS INTRODUCED to the Galactic Dark Horse in the 1980s at the Texas Star Party. A remarkable complex of dark nebulae with a striking resemblance to a prancing ebon [...]

THIS SEASON'S ICY MILKY WAY IS A deep-sky observer's paradise. Splashy open clusters, huge emission nebulae, and numerous planetary nebulae await the telescope. Many of the best-known planetary nebulae are [...]

IT HAS BEEN ALMOST TWO DECADES since nebula filters became an indispensable item in the eyepiece case of every serious observer. The so-called narrowband filters in particular can greatly improve [...]

Reflection nebula 1C 2641 (also known as Cederblad 112) is a brilliant blue cloud in the southern constellation Chamaeleon. Look closely to see the partially obscured star whose light is [...]

The Medusa Nebula (Abell 21) lies in the constellation Gemini. Observers likened it to the mythological figure because of the braided streamers of gas they saw. (20-inch RC Optical Systems [...]

For many northerners, Orion is a cold-weather constellation. The mighty Hunter doesn't climb high into a dark sky until October, and only then in the chilly hours before sunrise. By [...]

A giant stellar incubator 7,000 light-years away hatches its stars prematurely. Spectacular fields of nebulosity abound in the night sky to the delight of amateur astronomers everywhere. But the quest [...]