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NASA is celebrating the Hubble Space Telescope’s 33rd birthday with an ethereal image of a
nearby star-forming region, NGC 1333.
Located approximately 960 light-years away in the Perseus interstellar cloud, Hubble’s
colorful view unveils glowing gasses and pitch-black
dust stirred up, colliding, and blown around
by several hundred forming stars within the dark cloud.
Most of the star birth firestorm is hidden behind clouds of fine dust – essentially
soot - that are thicker toward the bottom of the image.
The blackness in the image is not empty space, but obscuring dust.
Powerful stellar winds, likely from the bright blue star at the top of the photo, are blowing
through a veil of dust.
The fine dust scatters the blue wavelengths of starlight.
Farther down, another super-hot star shines through filaments of obscuring dust.
A diagonal string of fainter nearby stars looks reddish because dust is filtering starlight
so more of the red light gets through.
The bottom of the picture presents a peek deep into the dark nebula.
Hubble captures the reddish glow of ionized hydrogen.
It looks like a fireworks finale, with several overlapping cascades of light.
This is caused by pencil-thin jets shooting out from newly forming stars that are hidden
from view.
This vista offers an example of the time when our Sun and planets formed inside such a dusty
molecular gas cloud, 4.6 billion years ago.
Our Sun didn’t form in isolation but was instead surrounded by other stars in a period
of frantic stellar birth, perhaps even more energetic and massive than the action in NGC 1333.
Because Hubble orbits above Earth’s atmosphere, it can give us these clear views of the many
wonders in our universe.
For 33 years, the Hubble Space Telescope has changed the way we think of space and our
place in the cosmos.
Hubble has refined our understanding of the age of the universe and its rate of expansion.
Its deep field images have made it possible for us to see across billions of light-years,
revealing ancient, adolescent galaxies that we can compare with our own Milky Way.
Closer to home, Hubble is revealing vibrant activity in our solar system and in other
star and planetary systems across the galaxy.
Hubble remains in good health and is expected
to continue its exploration of the universe for years to come, with unique capabilities
that complement other telescopes like Webb.
Five astronaut servicing missions, along with an expert technical team on the ground, have
kept the telescope at the peak of its scientific capabilities.
You can find out more about the Hubble Space Telescope at our website: nasa.gov/hubble
and on social media @NASAHubble.
[ Image of NGC 1333 slowly zooms out, starting with a closeup of a red dust cloud into the full image. Filled with a dark dust and stars shining through, with a bright blue star at the top ]
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