We enter the depths of the cosmos thanks to these images from the VLT telescope located at the Paranal Observatory in Chile, until we reach the depths of the bright constellation of Scorpio where we run into one of the brightest and most beautiful star-forming regions of our country. universe.
We are talking about NGC 6334 and NGC 6357, known as the Cat’s Paw Nebula and the Lobster Nebula respectively, which are located 5,500 and 8,000 light years away from Earth, near the end of the tail that gives this constellation its name. .
The English astronomer John Herschel was the first to discover them in the sky (specifically, he observed the ‘fingers’ of what would later become the Cat’s Paw nebula) back in June 1837.
Both are very active star-forming regions where hot young stars cause the surrounding hydrogen gas to glow bright red as we can see for ourselves.
This spectacular scene captured by the Very Large Telescope is completed by dark dust clouds that, despite the latest generation instruments in use today, the dust from these nebulae is so thick that much of its content remains hidden.
Seeing nebulae at different wavelengths leads to other visual interpretations. That is why when viewing it in infrared light it is possible that we see instead of a cat’s foot and a lobster, a dove and a skull, hence this set is also known as the War and Peace nebula.
Credit:
THAT N. Bartmann and ESO / N. Risinger (skysurvey.org)
