Fact Sheet
Lagoon Nebula
Like the clashes of hot and cold air that spawn tornadoes on Earth, the contrast between hot and cold interstellar clouds seems to have produced twisted funnels of gas and dust 5,000 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. The structures, photographed by Hubble Space Telescope in 1995, are more than a half light-year long, or about 200 times longer than the width of Pluto’s orbit. The radiation of hot, young stars, including O Herschel 36 (lower right), would be the source of the temperature differential between the hot surface and the cold interior of the clouds. Astronomers may use Hubble’s new instruments to measure the velocities of the clouds and confirm that they are indeed twisting.
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