View larger. | This new Hubble image shows IRAS 14568-6304, a young star that is cloaked in a golden haze. Image via ESA/Hubble & NASA / R. Sahai/ S. Meunier.
Stars are born deep within dense clouds of dust and gas, but the Hubble Space Telescope caught this year star at a special time. The European Space Agency (ESA) explained:
Like a hatchling pecking through its shell, this particular stellar newborn is forcing its way out into the surrounding universe.
The golden veil of light cloaks a young stellar object known only as IRAS 14568-6304. It is ejecting gas at supersonic speeds and eventually will have cleared a hole in the cloud, allowing it to be easily visible to the outside universe.
This particular cloud is known as the Circinus molecular cloud complex. It is 2,280 light-years away and stretches across 180 light-years of space. If our eyes could register the faint infrared glow of the gas in the cloud, it would stretch across our sky more than 70 times the size of the full moon. It contains enough gas to make 250,000 stars like the sun.
Our Editor-in-Chief Deborah Byrd works to keep all the astronomy balls in the air between EarthSky's website, YouTube page and social media platforms. She's the primary editor of our popular daily newsletter and a frequent host of EarthSky livestreams. Deborah created the EarthSky radio series in 1991 and founded EarthSky.org in 1994. Prior to that, she had worked for the University of Texas McDonald Observatory since 1976, and created and produced their Star Date radio series. She has won a galaxy of awards from the broadcasting and science communities, including having an asteroid named 3505 Byrd in her honor. In 2020, she won the Education Prize from the American Astronomical Society, the largest organization of professional astronomers in North America. A science communicator and educator since 1976, Byrd believes in science as a force for good in the world and a vital tool for the 21st century. "Being an EarthSky editor is like hosting a big global party for cool nature-lovers," she says.
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