The Real Space Chimps
The Monkey Head Nebula in this picture is a type of cosmic cloud known as an ‘emission’ nebula. The gas in these nebulae is remarkably hot because of the fiery newborn stars that zap their surroundings with sizzling rays of hot particles with lots of energy. This is similar to how sunlight warms our planet, but much, much hotter!
Credit:
ASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)
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