Explanation:
Alnitak,
Alnilam,
and
Mintaka,
are the bright bluish stars
from east to west (left to right) along the diagonal in
this gorgeous cosmic vista.
Otherwise known as the
Belt of Orion, these
three blue supergiant stars are hotter and much more
massive than the Sun.
They lie about 1,500 light-years away, born
of Orion's
well-studied interstellar clouds.
In fact, clouds of gas and dust adrift in
this region have
intriguing and some surprisingly familiar shapes, including the
dark Horsehead
Nebula and Flame Nebula near
Alnitak at the lower
left.
The famous Orion Nebula
itself lies off the bottom of this
star field
that covers about 4.5x3.5 degrees on the sky.
This
image was taken last month with a digital camera attached to a small
telescope in
Switzerland,
and better matches
human color
perception
than a more detailed composite taken over 15
years ago.
digg_url = 'http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap090210.html'; digg_skin = 'compact';
