Fact Sheet
Clearing Out the Neighborhood
The cluster of hot, young blue stars at the center of this image is blowing away what's left of the cloud of gas and dust that give birth to the stars in this recent Hubble Space Telescope image. The stars are in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a small companion galaxy to the Milky Way. Radiation from the bright stars strips away material from dense clumps of gas and dust, forming finger-like projections that point to the stars. Less-massive stars are embedded in some of these fingers. [NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)]
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