images

The Eta Carinae Nebula and Trumpler 14

by

Anglo-Australian Observatory/David Malin Images/Novapix

Reference

a-neb33-72005

Date

2006-09-18

In the small region pictured here are three of the brightest stars known in our Galaxy, each a million times more luminous than the Sun. To the left of the picture is an even more extreme star, Eta Carinae itself, shrouded in a small bright irregular nebula of its own making. In the upper right of the photograph is Trumpler 14, a cluster of very young stars which appears to be associated with a number of bright-edged 'elephant trunk' dust lanes, typical of star-forming regions. All these objects and most of the bright stars scattered across the face of the nebula are together in space at a distance of about 7000 light years. Despite this distance, the Carina nebula is clearly visible to the unaided eye to those of us who live in the southern hemisphere.